America’s Next Top Model alum Shandi Sullivan has reactivated her GoFundMe after her claims about being sexually assaulted on the show were resurfaced in Netflix’s three-part docuseries.
Sullivan, 43, participated in Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model, which premiered earlier this month. After Sullivan opened up about an alleged encounter on America’s Next Top Model that wasn’t consensual despite how it was framed, she received an outpouring of support online.
Sullivan has since reactivated a GoFundMe fundraiser she started before Reality Check‘s debut.
“Originally, I created this fundraiser because I was forced out of my home of 11 years so the landlord could sell the building,” she wrote via Instagram on Sunday, February 22. “Now it’s been updated at the request of YOU amazing people! A ton of you reached out wanting to know how to support me. I stated on my Instagram that I am not looking for anyone to donate or send money. It’s a rough time for the majority of us right now.”
Shandi Sullivan is sharing her story in the new docuseries Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model. The docuseries sees models, judges and America’s Next Top Model insiders, including creator Tyra Banks, reflect on the competition show’s complicated history. Among the participants is former model Sullivan, who claimed that she was sexually assaulted in an […]
Sullivan is also still paying off a $2,000 veterinary bill after one of her cats died four months prior, adding, “Anything left over will be put into my savings and who KNOWS?!…maybe if we can raise enough funds, I could put a down payment on a home and start that animal sanctuary I always wanted to. Never too old or too late to DREAM!”
She concluded: “Thank you to everyone for being supportive and kind! It is helping me get through this super rough time.”
Sullivan has raised $15,000 of her $16,000 goal so far.
In Netflix’s docuseries, Sullivan was asked about an incident that took place during her stint on the reality show. Sullivan recalled nearly winning cycle 2 before a group trip to Italy where she and the rest of the models spent time with local men. During a party with the guys, Sullivan was filmed kissing one of the men while heavily intoxicated.
“I remember him on top of me. I was blacked out. No one did anything to stop it,” she claimed. “And it all got filmed, all of it.”
Despite Sullivan being too impaired to consent to sex, the incident was framed as a cheating scandal on the show. (Sullivan had a boyfriend back home at the time of filming.)
America’s Next Top Model’s most memorable contestants aren’t staying quiet about their experience on TV. After more than 24 seasons, the reality show is being put under the microscope in a new Netflix docuseries titled Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model. While host Tyra Banks and judges J. Alexander, Jay Manuel and Nigel Barker […]
“I think after getting out of the hot tub and whatever happened after that, I think [production] should have been like, ‘Alright, this has gone too far. We have to pull her out of this,’” Sullivan said.
Creator and executive producer Tyra Banks had a different response, claiming in a separate interview, “I do remember her story. It’s a little difficult for me to talk about production because that’s not my territory.”
After Reality Check came out, Sullivan reflected on the trauma she experienced.
“At the age of 43, I continue to struggle with it — always smiling,” she wrote via Instagram. “That’s why I took this opportunity. Knowing that Tyra didn’t have control over my narrative, that the director and producers here had my back … that’s why I did it. I did it for me. Because I mattered and I still do!”
She concluded: “The love I have felt today has been immense. Thank you to everyone that heard me.”