Taylor Swift’s rumored romance with NFL player Travis Kelce has lots of people feeling fuzzy — but not Kelce’s ex-girlfriend Maya Benberry, who slammed the Kansas City Chiefs tight end as an unfaithful “narcissist” in an interview this week.
“Like the saying goes, ‘Once a cheater, always a cheater,’” Benberry, who met Kelce as a contestant on his 2016 reality show, told “Inside Edition” on Thursday. “Certain qualities don’t change in men. I feel like Travis is a narcissist, so most narcissists don’t change.”
The life coach said she dated the football player for eight months after winning his short-lived show, “Catching Kelce.” Benberry told “Inside Edition” that Kelce had met her parents, given her a key to his home and made her believe they had “a future” before he allegedly started dating model Kayla Nicole one month before he and Benberry broke up.
She also questioned Kelce’s connection with Swift, who attended his game Sunday and left Arrowhead Stadium with him to viral social media buzz. Benberry said that the reason she doubts the “genuineness” of Kelce’s rumored romance with the singer is “because he’s talking to the media a lot.”
An unnamed source close to Kelce defended the NFL player on Thursday, telling Page Six that Benberry wasn’t dating Kelce “long enough for him to cheat on her,” and that he was “contractually obligated not to announce their breakup.” The source also dismissed Benberry’s accusations as “a 15-minutes-of-fame type of a moment.”
When “Inside Edition” host Jim Moret asked Benberry how it felt to be characterized as a “bitter ex-girlfriend who’s out for her 15 minutes of fame,” she said she was offended. “Five years ago, when I said the allegations about cheating and when I talked about that we were together for eight months, his camp, his team, and even he himself didn’t say anything about it. I do feel a way because I did like you.”
“It’s nothing about Taylor,” she continued. “It’s more about you led me to believe that we had a future. And now, five years later, you’re laughing, and I feel like you’re mocking me. I’m not jealous or bitter about Taylor … My issue is more with Travis.”
Benberry did reportedly “like” an Instagram comment earlier this week that rated Swift a “5.” She later walked this back and explained: “I don’t think that Taylor is a 5. The initial comment was someone complimenting me so I liked it without even paying attention.”
Benberry has since blasted Swift’s fans for harassing her.
“Swifties are aggressive,” she told Moret on Thursday. “Very negative, very hypocritical. It’s really crazy to me that someone that I think is positive and really nice has such a negative and angry fanbase. I don’t know Taylor Swift, but I’m a fan of her music.”
“I don’t feel any way about her dating Travis,” she added. “It’s cute … I mean, I had him first.”