Ben Affleck Responds To Backlash Following Jennifer Garner Comments

Ben Affleck has set the record straight on his comments about ex-wife Jennifer Garner which made headlines early this week. 

Speaking on Jimmy Kimmel Live, the Tender Bar actor addressed news making rounds on his comments about his divorce, noting that it “made it seem as if I was saying the exact opposite of what I said.”

“I had gone on and said how much we respect each other and cared about each other and cared about our kids and put them first and went through our stuff,” he noted while also addressing the claim that he’d “blamed my ex-wife for my alcoholism and that I was trapped in this marriage…just made me out to be like the worst, most insensitive, stupid, awful guy.”

Setting the record straight, he said, “That’s not true. I don’t believe that. It’s the exact opposite of who I am, what I believe, and I would never want my kids to think I would ever say a bad word about their mom…it hurts my feelings.”

In an interview on SiriusXM’s The Howard Stern Show, Affleck reflected on his marriage to Garner, their divorce, and his struggle with drinking during their marriage. 

During a part of his interview with Stern, Affleck, who is currently involved with Jennifer Lopez—discussed the lead-up to his 2015 split with Garner, noting, “Part of why I started drinking was because I was trapped.”

“I was like, ‘I can’t leave because of my kids, but I’m not happy, what do I do?’ And what I did was [I] drank a bottle of scotch and fell asleep on the couch, which turned out not to be the solution,” he told Stern. However, as Affleck explained, he and Garner realized they didn’t want their relationship to “be the model that our kids see of marriage.”

Despite feeling initially good about the interview, Affleck revealed that he has a mood shift once his comments about Garner made its way into social media, creating a narrative that didn’t sit well with him.