YIKES

American Eagle Nepo Baby Divorces Wife After Calling Her ‘Unfit to Be a Mother’ on Tape

Jeffrey Schottenstein is heir to the $2.7 billion American Eagle fortune.

The marriage of a clothing scion is ending in nightmarish fashion. Jeffrey Schottenstein, the son of billionaire American Eagle CEO Jay Schottenstein, is splitting from his wife, Ariella Schottenstein, after he was caught on tape telling the couple’s former bodyguard that she was “unfit to be a mother.” Schottenstein’s barb at his wife came to light as part of a May 2024 complaint that the security guard, Rock Pereira, filed against the family after Ariella abruptly fired him. Jeffrey called Pereira when he learned of the firing and railed against his then-pregnant wife. “Going to a doctor’s appointment three weeks before she’s pregnant and firing someone for no cause—that is unfit to be a mother in my eyes,” he said in a tape that the New York Post obtained. A year later, on May 15, Ariella filed for divorce, and the couple has been locked in litigation since. Three years ago, they were memorably engaged in the Big Apple: Jeffrey proposed to Ariella on the American Eagle billboard in Times Square. Schottenstein works at the furniture business American Signature, another part of the familial fashion portfolio that also includes DSW.