Jermaine Dupri defended himself against claims he “fumbled” his relationship with Janet Jackson during a Thursday interview with Hot 97.
“I be trying to figure out why y’all don’t say she fumbled me.”
The producer and rapper dated Jackson for seven years, from 2002 to 2009.
When show producer Nessa asked Dupri to address claims that he missed out by not staying with Jackson, the 52-year-old pushed back hard.
“I don’t know what a fumble is,” Dupri said. “I’m not something that you just let roll down the street.”
Nessa responded that she didn’t think the “Together Again” singer would mess up.
Dupri described their time together as a normal relationship that simply ran its course. “We was together for eight years. It’s a relationship.”
Recent Awkward Encounter
The conversation turned to Jackson’s 2023 Together Again tour stop in Atlanta, where she brought Dupri on stage to perform.
Dupri said the moment felt strange because Jackson barely acknowledged him.
“She didn’t even actually talk to me when she came out,” he explained. “It was like a weird, ‘You’re gonna come out, and I’m gonna change my clothes.'”
He said he tried to get her attention, but she walked away. “I was trying to get her to talk, but she was walking away.”
Dupri noticed people around them picking up on the tension. “I seen people coming like, she didn’t even want to talk to you. And I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s what it look like.'”
How It All Started
Jackson began dating Dupri in 2002 after ending her eight-year marriage to René Elizondo Jr.
Dupri previously described their relationship’s beginning on the Million Dollaz Worth of Game podcast in 2023. He said he was initially “just on some like hang out [stuff].”
The couple would argue because he wasn’t producing her music.
Dupri felt Jackson “didn’t need him” and he didn’t want to interfere with her business relationship with longtime collaborators Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis.
Why It Ended
Distance became a major problem in their relationship, Dupri explained on the expediTIously podcast in 2020.
“I started seeing so many other things that I wanted to do, and so many other places that I wanted to go,” Dupri said. “I started thinking like marriage for me wasn’t gonna work.”
He admitted he felt ready for marriage at one point but couldn’t commit fully.
“I felt married… I think the only thing that created a difference for me was the fact that we didn’t live together. We had an eight-year, nine-year relationship, but we didn’t live with each other.”
The living situation ultimately kept them from taking the next step, despite their long relationship.
