In a plot twist that could only belong to the most fabulous of true-crime soap operas, Joe Exotic — America’s tiger-taming, mullet-sporting, chaos-summoning antihero — is once again serving heartbreak with a side of hashtags. His sixth (yes, sixth) husband, Jorge Marquez Flores, has been abruptly deported to Mexico, proving that when it comes to love, federal prison is less of a dating app and more of a cursed dating simulator.
RELATED:Joe Exotic’s Ex-Husband Says The Wedding Was “Fake”
Flores, a 33-year-old fellow inmate-turned-husband, was released from a Texas prison only to be whisked away to an ICE detention center — and within hours, right back across the border. According to Joe Exotic, aka Joseph Maldonado-Passage, Flores never even got the hearing he was promised.
“Rough day getting around. The ICE agents didn’t understand why he got sent back so fast,” Joe posted on Instagram, sounding more like a tired pop diva than a convicted felon. “He had a hearing scheduled for tomorrow. @realdonaldtrump just let me go to Mexico and you can keep Carole Baskin.”
Let it be known: if your breakup tweets don’t include references to both immigration policy and Carole Baskin, are you even living?
And while we’re on the subject of theatrical references, this entire saga is giving Les Misérables meets RuPaul’s Drag Race: Behind Bars — complete with vows exchanged in a correctional facility and declarations of love more dramatic than Joe’s 2014 three-way wedding.
Just last month, Joe introduced Flores to the world with a tweet (or is it still called a tweet on X? No one knows anymore):
“Never been more proud of someone. Meet my husband, Jorge Flores Maldonado.”
Their romance, forged in the fire of shared incarceration, seemed oddly… sincere. Joe claimed they spent “every possible moment together,” and honestly, that might be the most grounded thing he’s ever said. But as fate — or federal bureaucracy — would have it, their fairytale ended not with a kiss, but with a deportation van and a very confused ICE officer.
It’s worth noting that Joe Exotic’s love life is somehow more labyrinthine than his legal battles. Flores now joins the exclusive lineup of husbands that includes J.C. Hartpence (in prison for murder), Brian Rhyne (deceased), John Finlay (who now has teeth and a wife), Travis Maldonado (tragically passed), and Dillon Passage (ex-husband and Instagram influencer). Truly, a bouquet of men fit for a Netflix sequel.
Still, this chapter hits differently. Maybe it’s the institutional setting. Maybe it’s the way Joe clings to the hope of “evidence” clearing his name. Or maybe, just maybe, we’ve all grown a little too attached to this chaotic gay cowboy who once ran for president and still won’t let go of his vendetta against that flower-crowned feline rights advocate.
Even from prison, Joe’s melodrama manages to captivate. He’s out here posting emotional pleas, tagging presidents, and publicly grieving a marriage that’s now divided by a border wall. It’s part heartbreak, part reality TV epilogue — and somehow, it’s all just… very gay. Not in a rainbow-flag, parade kind of way, but in the raw, messy, passion-fueled camp way. The kind of love story that ends not with “happily ever after,” but with one of you being deported before brunch.
Will Flores make it back to the U.S.? Will Joe ever be free to follow him? Who knows. But one thing’s for sure: Carole Baskin is somewhere rolling her eyes. And Joe Exotic? He’s still the reigning drama queen of the American penal system.
We’ll leave you with this:
Love is love, even when it wears a jumpsuit.
Source: People
Well, I guess all that sucking up to Trump and trying to be a Magat didn’t help at all. God the way that poor boy has Joe’s face and name all over him is just sad. Maybe in Mexico he will live his own life again,and get away from the Joe/Trump cult.