What You Need To Know About Rachel Lindsay

Rachel Lindsay was first introduced to Bachelor fans in 2017, and since then, nothing has ever been the same. After getting rejected by Nick Viall, she became the first Black Bachelorette lead ever — and these days, she continues to make headlines as a public figure who is not afraid to use her platform and address issues head-on. 

Though her days on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette are long behind her, Lindsay has gone on to remain a part of the hit franchise by returning to the show as an advisor, as well as through a number of mediums, including podcasts and social media. The fact that her season of The Bachelorette made history means that it is hard to imagine what the franchise would be like today without her, and hopefully, she has helped paved the way for more diversity in the show's future seasons.

Just starting to catch up on Bachelor history? Let's get into what you need to know about Lindsay, the lawyer-turned-TV personality who has remained a major player in Bachelor Nation.

Like a number of other very influential The Bachelor alumni, Rachel Lindsay first ended up on fans' radar when she competed on two-time Bachelorette contestant Nick Viall's season of the show. She made it pretty far, only getting eliminated after Viall's hometown dates, and during her time on the series, she brought up important conversations about what it would mean for Viall, who is white, to potentially marry a Black woman and have children with her.

Though Viall and Lindsay ultimately weren't meant to be, they remain on good terms even today. As his season was airing, Viall even shared with ET that he felt they became "great friends" as they got to know each other on the show.

"As a friend, I miss her, you know, and I wish her well," he told the outlet in 2017. "Maybe down the line we'll be able to rekindle that friendship, but I'm very excited for her journey." It seems his wish did eventually come true. In 2019, Lindsay appeared on his podcast, The Viall Files, and they've interacted on social media plenty of times since then.

Rachel Lindsay had a career before her time on The Bachelor, and a pretty high-powered one at that. After earning her Bachelor's degree at University of Texas at Austin and graduating from Marquette Law School, Lindsay became an attorney in her home state of Texas, and in a 2018 interview with Dispute Resolution Magazine, she spoke out about how being on reality TV made her even better in her line of work.

"The platform provided in participating and starring in this franchise has given me the confidence, opportunities, and freedom to venture into other areas of law that interest me such as sports and entertainment law," she said at the time. "I am able to use my knowledge and expertise outside the courtroom on talk shows, podcasts, speaking engagements, and articles."

Eventually ready to try her hand at something new, Lindsay did end up walking away from law entirely. "I felt like I had hit a plateau, where I was just going through the motions, and I needed a change," she told Refinery29 in 2019. "I felt fulfilled in the sense that I knew I wanted to be an attorney and I was living that dream out, but it wasn't enough for me."

After gaining so much popularity on The Bachelor after being sent home by Nick Viall, Rachel Lindsay had a chance to take another stab at reality TV love when she was made the first Black Bachelorette in the franchise's history. Following the casting announcement, Lindsay told Good Morning America's Michael Strahan that it was a role she was "honored" to take on.

"I just hope that people rally behind me like they did in Nick's season," Lindsay said on the show. "Just realize that my journey is, you know, I'm just trying to find love. Even though I'm an African-American woman, it's not different from any other bachelorette."

At the end of her season, Lindsay got engaged to her final pick, Bryan Abasolo, a chiropractor and wellness coach who was originally from Miami before he moved to Dallas to be with his new fiancée. The couple now splits their time between Los Angeles and Miami, where Abasolo's current practice is located. 

After meeting and falling in love on The Bachelorette, Rachel Lindsay and Bryan Abasolo were engaged for two years before they eventually tied the knot in Mexico in 2019, turning down the chance to have a TV wedding like some other Bachelor stars have had in the past.

Despite the fact that many Bachelor relationships do not go the distance, so far, Lindsay and Abasolo are still married. So, what's their secret? Well, at the end of the day, they like each other. Lindsay told People that the foundation of their relationship is all tied to the fact that they are "really great friends" who enjoyed spending the COVID-19 lockdown together. "I think that having this time in quarantine was beautiful for us because we really got to connect again and spend every day together," she said. "We're starting to have those conversations about where do we plant roots and having children and what's the timeline for that." 

Their respective careers do keep them apart from time to time, a subject they addressed on Abasolo's podcast, Dr. ABS Healthcast. "You're focusing on your practice and building it to a place you want it to be, and I am here in L.A. working for Extra and doing other things, and we're doing this to eventually bring ourselves together," Lindsay said. "We have a timeline for ourselves. We know where we're going, we know where we're headed, and we know what we're trying to build as Abasolos."

With reality TV experience under her belt thanks to The Bachelorette and The Bachelor, Rachel Lindsay has gone on to make working as a host on TV one of her main gigs. At the beginning of her post-Bachelor TV career, Lindsay began working with ESPN, guest hosting the network's show First Take, and has also appeared on SportsCenter and ESPN Radio.

Then, Lindsay went on to host MTV's Ghosted: Love Gone Missing, which, as the title suggests, is a show about getting closure from relationships that ended when one person ghosted the other. She also works with Extra as a guest correspondent.

Think Lindsay's slate couldn't be more full? Well, you've got another think coming. She also happens to cohost Bachelor Happy Hour, ABC's official podcast where she and fellow former Bachelorette star Becca Kufrin discuss the franchise and interview contestants, as well as Higher Learning, where she and former TMZ host Van Lathan discuss Black culture and politics and conduct interviews in 90-minute episodes that are released twice a week.

Since Rachel Lindsay started out as a lawyer and has found continued success in her post-Bachelorette life, it really checks out that she seems to have a lot of money in the bank. (And yes, that pun was very much intended.) After all, Lindsay has several different streams of income coming in these days, between her podcasts, TV gigs, and even her sponsored Instagram posts.

According to an estimate from Wealthy Genius, Lindsay could be worth between $1 million to $3 million as of 2021, although it's impossible to say how accurate that number is without Lindsay confirming it herself, of course. 

Needless to say, between the money Lindsay brings in herself and her husband's presumably lucrative career in the health and wellness field, she and Bryan Abasolo are likely sitting pretty in the money department as they spend their time living the bi-coastal life.

Since her time on The Bachelorette, Rachel Lindsay has often used her platform to bring attention to racial inequality, both in the United States and within the reality franchise. Throughout 2020 and 2021, Lindsay spoke out about injustice against Black people on Instagram, her blog, and various outlets. "Despite these injustices, we are not fighting for revenge but equality," she wrote in an essay for GMA that was penned during the wave of protests following the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery. "Despite the oppression, we are still strong and resilient continuing to fight and stand up to the system. Despite the blatant ignorance and racial stereotypes, we are proud."

In June 2020, Lindsay spoke out about the lack of diversity in the Bachelor franchise, pointing out that the ABC series hadn't done enough to change their pattern of tokenizing contestants of color.

"I still feel that I have not been loud enough on the deep-rooted, 18-year systemic problems in this franchise," Lindsay wrote in a blog post. "You never want to bite the hand that feeds you, but you also do not want to be aiding and abetting problematic behavior. I am affiliated with this franchise and to be silent on some matters is to still be complicit with these cycles of detrimental conduct. If you saw your brother or sister continually doing something wrong would you not hold them accountable?"

A contestant on Matt James' season of The Bachelor came under fire in early 2021. When photos of Rachael Kirkconnell at an antebellum plantation-themed party in college surfaced, fans and fellow Bach alum condemned her behavior. One person who defended her, however, happened to be host Chris Harrison, whose conversation with Rachel Lindsay regarding the scandal quickly turned controversial.

During the Extra interview, Lindsay said that the photos weren't "a good look" for Kirkconnell, but Harrison insisted that it's only because people know better in 2021 than they did in 2018 and called for forgiveness. "We all need to have a little grace, a little understanding, a little compassion," Harrison said. "Because I have seen some stuff online — this judge, jury, executioner thing — where people are just tearing this girl's life apart and diving into, like, her parents, her parents' voting record. It's unbelievably alarming to watch this. I haven't heard Rachael speak on this yet. And until I actually hear this woman have a chance to speak, who am I to say any of this?"

Harrison received backlash for his response, which led him to apologize to Lindsay and the Bachelor community on Instagram before news broke that he had stepped down from hosting the Bachelor after show, After The Final Rose, with Emmanuel Acho taking his place.

After the drama involving Chris Harrison and the repeated lack of diversity on the show, Rachel Lindsay said the Bachelor Party podcast that she had enough — and it sounds like she isn't the only person who feels this way, though filming for the next season of The Bachelorette is already underway. She also made it quite clear that she will have nothing to do with the upcoming season. 

"Anybody who's standing up for change, I don't understand how you could be a part of this current season, because as we have seen in this current episode, there is still so much work to be done," Lindsay said. "I don't want my name to be affiliated. I have heard that there are several people of color who have removed themselves from the show that were a part of casting for this current season." She went on to note that while Harrison did apologize, the "lingering impact" of his words is not to be disregarded. "So, of course, people don't want to be a part of it — people who don't feel included don't want to be a part of it," she said.

Whether or not The Bachelor is a part of Lindsay's future plans, she has already built a huge career and legacy based on standing up for what she believes in.