One of the things that makes Donald Trump a unique politician is he is a former reality show star who appeared in a slew of different movies. Despite his history, longtime and new Survivor fans who are figuring out which season to watch first wouldn’t have anticipated how Donald affected two former players from Jeff Probst’s show.

Throughout Survivor’s history, the show has featured many great seasons, several incredible winners, some truly fantastic players, and iconic players like Jerri Manthey. As a result of Jerri’s iconic status, she still has many dedicated fans years after she last played the game. Many of those same fans were amazed to see how Donald Trump’s re-election resulted in Jerri calling out the disgraced former Survivor player Jeff Varner.

Donald Trump’s Re-Election Caused Jerri Manthey To Call Out Jeff Varner

During Joe Biden’s Presidency, a law was passed that would ban TikTok if the Chinese company that owned it, ByteDance, didn’t sell it to an American company. Even though Joe signed the bill that created that law, he declined to enforce it. When Donald Trump took office on January 20th, 2025, a lot of people wanted to see how he would handle the law.

As an Associated Press article detailed, Donald signed an executive order that delayed the TikTok ban. Donald also argued that the American government should take partial ownership of TikTok. In response to those statements from Donald, the MSNBC host Joy Reid published a video that ended with calling out what she saw as the dangers of that possibility. “He’s saying that that government controlled by him and a bunch of tech oligarchs, they should now control the gov[ernment], the algorithm behind TikTok, which is still manipulatable and which can still be used to manipulate you. Except it won’t be a Chinese-owned company or the Chinese government that can manipulate you. It’ll be the American.”

After Joy posted her video, Jerri shared the clip on her own Instagram account. Jerri’s decision to share the video that was inspired by Donald Trump becoming President again resulted in Jerri brutally calling Jeff Varner out.

This article will reveal how Jerri posting Joy’s video led to her calling Jeff out. Before that, however, this article will detail how Jerri told Jeff in an Instagram comment that him outing Zeke Smith made her have zero respect for him.

“It’s only fair for me to share that YOU lost any semblance of respect from me when you – as a gay man – who chose to stay in the closet while the rest of us respected your decision – chose to OUT a vulnerable person – who wasn’t ready to come out of the closet (something you should’ve had empathy for) – ON NATIONAL TELEVISION. So there is NO OPINION, NO ADVICE, NO INPUT – coming from you that holds ANY validity in my mind whatsoever. And I’m not alone.”

Still not done, Jerri went on to insult the person that Jeff had become.

“You are a sad unhappy person who preys on other people. And there is NOTHING you can say or do to me that will cause anything but indifference on my part. You do not matter to me.”

Jerri clearly didn’t leave any room for interpretation of how she felt about Jeff.

After looking at how Jerri called Jeff out, it is worth looking at what led to her lashing out at him.

Over the last several years, Joy Reid has become the target of a lot of anger on social media. As it turns out, Jeff Varner appears to be one of the people who can’t stand Joy. After she shared the clip, Jeff commented with a since-deleted text rant about Jerri sharing Joy’s video.

“You follow and believe this woman? Joy Reid is a f****** idiot race-baiting dumba**. Her job is not to report truth. Her job is to turn everything into something against black people first, then democrats. Helen Keller could tell the new TT algorithm is more fair than what was there before. I went to bed last night seeing democrats melting on TT because they could tell the algorithm was different. Joy Reid has never had a clue and is still out there spewing b*******. It’s why she has the lowest viewership on a network that is being separated from NBC News because it’s a joke no one watches.”

Despite how long that text rant was, Jeff’s since-deleted comment on Jerri’s post still wasn’t done.

At the end of his comment, Jeff gave Jerri unsolicited advice.

Jeff finished his since-deleted comment by advising Jerri that he believed she should delete her post sharing Joy’s video.

“I’m surprised to see someone as intelligent and aware as you trying to get your followers to follow her. You might be the only person on the planet doing that. If I were you, I’d consider deleting this one.”

If Jeff expected Jerri to take his advice and delete the video she shared, that isn’t what happened.

Instead, Jerri initially responded on Instagram by advising Jeff to delete his comment on her post. On top of advising Jeff to delete his comment, Jerri hinted there would be consequences if he didn’t delete his comment.

Even though Jeff later deleted his comment, he didn’t do that quickly enough for Jerri. As a result, Jerri unleashed on Jeff in the comment that was quoted above. Since Jeff eventually deleted his comment, it is only possible to see an image of Jerri’s response in screengrabs, like one that was posted on X/Twitter.

After learning about the full context of Jerri and Jeff’s Instagram interaction, it is worth looking at one other thing she wrote. Despite how brutal her response was, Jerri ended it by wishing Jeff well. Still, Jerri also asked Jeff to stop following her.

“Good luck navigating the current administration. When you see the light, feel free to reach out. Kindly remove yourself from my followers. I wish you happiness and peace.”

Jerri Manthey Went On To Clarify Her Take On The Post That Led To Her Calling Jeff Varner Out

As this article revealed, the public tension between Jerri Manthey and Jeff Varner began when she posted a Joy Reid video. Looking at that post that remains on Jerri’s Instagram account, it is clear that people other than Jeff were arguing with her in the comment section. That resulted in Jerri eventually clarifying why she posted the Joy video that led to her calling Jeff out.

Roughly four days after she posted the video, Jerri commented on her post. Jerri’s comment began by expressing her frustration that she needed to clarify why she posted the video.

“Omg. Let me clarify the reason for this post. I can’t believe I’m wasting time explaining myself when things are so obvious but here we go.”

Jerri then went on to explain that Joe Biden’s involvement in passing the TikTok ban had nothing to do with why she posted the video. Instead, Jerri explained that she was frustrated by Donald Trump’s positions on TikTok.

“Biden‘s part in this is irrelevant. It is not part of the narrative here. The point is that this started with Trump because he wanted to ban it during his first term. And now he is turning himself into the hero for saving it. That’s it end of story. My whole point. I’ll state the facts again here.”

Jerri finished her response by outlining some of the timeline surrounding the TikTok ban.

Survivor

Release Date

May 31, 2000

Network

CBS

Showrunner

Jeff Probst

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