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Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
Entertainment
Christie D’Zurilla

Britney Spears accuses Alyssa Milano of ‘bullying’ over tweet in wake of welfare check

LOS ANGELES — Britney Spears is still cranky about people calling the cops to check up on her — and now she’s directed her frustration toward actor Alyssa Milano, who tweeted more than six weeks ago, “Someone please go check on Britney Spears.”

“It saddens me to see things about me from people who don’t know me !!!,” the singer wrote late Tuesday on her Instagram stories, to which she added a photo of Milano’s Dec. 20 tweet. “This definitely feels like a form of bullying !!! Ladies, we are supposed to be rooting for one another not pulling one another down !!!”

Spears — who for a few days last week deactivated her Instagram account, as she’s done many times before — gently chided her fans after a number of them called Ventura County law enforcement the night of Jan. 24 to request a welfare check.

No such check was needed, according to the “I’m a Slave 4 U” singer, who wrote on Instagram after sheriffs left, “I love and adore my fans but this time things went a little too far and my privacy was invaded. The police never entered my home and when they came to my gate they quickly realized there was no issue and left immediately.”

She continued, “This felt like I was being gaslit and bullied once the incident made it to the news and being portrayed once again in a poor and unfair light by the media.” Then she asked fans to respect her privacy.

It’s unclear why Spears decided to focus on Milano’s tweet Tuesday night, or why Milano tweeted it. At the time, right before Christmas, some Very Online fans were again worried about Spears’ safety because they thought they saw her — in a since-deleted video — making a hand signal that means a person needs help.

The same day as the Milano tweet, Spears posted three videos shot in Mexico, where she had gone with hubby Sam Asghari for her 40th birthday on Dec. 2. TMZ reported fans were concerned because they thought she was posting “old” content from the birthday trip, and she had mentioned she was traveling to New York City, though there were no paparazzi photos showing her in the Big Apple.

But “sources close to the singer” told the outlet the couple was in Mexico again and that the content was new. Spears was doing a head fake telling fans she was New York City-bound, TMZ’s sources said.

Spears was under the watchful eyes of a conservatorship — which included intrusive and possibly illegal surveillance — from early 2008 until she was released from it, nearly 14 years later, in November 2021. Since fighting for her personal freedom from oversight, Spears has been subjected to continued oversight from fans concerned about her safety.

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