Hailey Baldwin Reveals Whether She Started Dating Justin Bieber While He Was Still Seeing Selena Gomez

‘Contrary to popular belief,’ Hailey Baldwin’s romance timeline isn’t as accurate as many have thought. In a new interview, she sheds light on a long-standing rumor that she began dating Justin Bieber while he was still involved with Selena Gomez in 2018.

Hailey Baldwin is setting the record straight about whether or not Justin Bieber was single (and for how long) when they got back together in 2018 — not long after his rekindled romance (in late 2017) with Selena Gomez didn’t work out. “People don’t know, too, we had been talking for a while before we got back together,” Hailey said on Ashley Graham‘s Pretty Big Deal podcast on November 17. “Contrary to popular belief,” she noted, “he had been single for a while and I had been single and we were kind of just trying to figure life out.”

Beliebers may recall when Justin had a rollercoaster ride of romances in 2018. — He reunited with his on-again, off-again girlfriend Selena, which led fans to believe they were finally going to get their happily ever after, following years of highs and lows. However, in March, rumblings of trouble in paradise between Selena and Justin emerged.

By at least June, the “Holy” singer, 26, was dating his longtime friend and ex (they dated in 2015), Hailey. Their romance led to a summer engagement when JB got down on one knee and proposed to the model, 23, during a July vacation to the Bahamas. With the joy of their engagement, came the plethora of critics who depicted their romance timeline. Many fans accused Hailey of dating Justin before he was completely free from his relationship with Selena.

While Justin and Hailey ignored any negativity surrounding their relationship, Selena seemed to address the situation through her music. In her October 2019-released hit, “Lose You to Love Me,” Selena sings the lyrics, “In two months you replaced us like it was easy.” Despite not naming her ex, fans felt certain that the song was inspired by the sequence of events in 2018.

Elsewhere in the podcast interview, Hailey acknowledged that her romance with Justin traveled quickly from “talking” to marriage. “Everything happened really fast, I think everybody knows that,” she told Ashley, recalling, “Everybody was kind of, like, ‘Hey, did you get married?'”

Fans of the couple will remember when they tied the knot for the first time in September 2018 — just two months after they got engaged. The two said “I do” in a quickie courthouse ceremony in New York City. One year later, Justin and Hailey wed in a more formal ceremony in front of their closest friends and family in South Carolina in September 2019.