Gisele Bundchen Denies Cheating on Tom Brady With Boyfriend Joaquim Valente: ‘That Is a Lie’
Gisele Bündchen cleared up the rumors that she cheated on ex-husband Tom Brady with boyfriend Joaquim Valente.
"That is a lie," Bündchen, 43, told The New York Times in a Saturday, March 23 profile in which she was asked point-blank about the allegations that she had an affair with the jiu-jitsu trainer.
The supermodel said that many women who leave their marriages face such salacious speculation. “This is something that happens to a lot of women who get blamed when they have the courage to leave an unhealthy relationship and are labeled as being unfaithful,” Bündchen lamented. “They have to deal with their communities. They have to deal with their family. Of course for me, it just happens to be a little bit amplified.”
She declined to say what actually caused her and Brady, 46, to split in 2022 after 13 years of marriage. “No one really knows what happens between two people, only the two people in the relationship,” she said.
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Bündchen and the retired football player coparent son Benjamin, 14, and daughter Vivian, 11. (Brady also shares son Jack, 16, with ex Bridget Moynahan.)
Since quickly finalizing their divorce more than one year ago, Bündchen has found herself falling in love again.
“This is the first time I am seeing someone that was a friend of mine first,” she told NYT. “It’s very different. It is very honest, and it’s very transparent.”
Bündchen and Valente were first spotted together in November 2022, just one month after her split from Brady, but an insider exclusively told Us Weekly that the pair's relationship didn't turn romantic until mid-2023.
“Joaquim was there for Gisele through her divorce, as a friend, and they turned romantic this past summer,” a source exclusively told Us in February after the couple were spotted kissing on a romantic Valentine's Day date.
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The insider noted that Valente is "amazing" with her children and added, “Gisele also loves being with someone who is from Brazil, they both have a shared history that she hasn’t had with anyone she’s dated."
Before taking their friendship to the next level, Bündchen said that she was happy that she was close with Valente and his family, despite rumors swirling.
“I think, at this point, unfortunately, because I’m divorced, I’m sure that [people will] try to attach me to anything,” she said in an April Vanity Fair cover story. “I’m so grateful to know [Joaquim and his siblings], because not only have they helped me and helped my kids, but they have become great friends, and Joaquim especially. … It’s so good to have that kind of energy, to have my kids around that type of energy.”
