Roseanne Barr Reveals Adoption Agency ‘Bribe’ Helped Find Baby She Gave Up

Roseanne Barr opens up about one of the most personal chapters of her life in her new documentary Roseanne Is America: reuniting with the daughter she placed for adoption as a teenager.

Back in 1971, at just 18 years old, Barr was sent to the Salvation Army Home for Unwed Mothers in Denver, where she gave birth to her first child, a baby girl named Brandi Brown.

Before signing the adoption papers, Barr says she made a heartfelt promise to her newborn: ‘I’ll see you again when you’re 18, because I’m not going to change my name, I’m going to be famous. I’m going to have my own show named Roseanne.’

Years later, that prediction came true—and so did the reunion.  

According to Barr, it was her rise to fame that prompted the National Enquirer to track down her daughter—using questionable means to obtain the information. 

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‘It all came out because when I got famous, the National Enquirer found my daughter by bribing someone in records in Colorado for my name, her name and her adoptive parents’ name,’ she says in the documentary.

Despite the questionable ethics behind the discovery, Barr holds no grudge: ‘Am I upset about it? No. I’m grateful.’

Barr also reflects on the circumstances surrounding her first pregnancy, recalling how her family handled the situation. 

‘Mom didn’t want the neighbors to be ashamed of her,’ she claims int he doc. ‘When I look back on that, I about bust a gut laughing because they were all drunks and perverts.’

In 2024, Barr shared a rare photo with Brandi on Instagram, showing the pair in matching ‘Love’ shirts and knit beanies. 

In the caption, she referred to her daughter as her ‘oldest bb’ and revealed that Brandi was 52 at the time. 

She also noted they had reunited when Brandi was 17, adding, ‘[God] is good.’

In a 1989 People interview, Barr described the overwhelming connection she felt the moment they saw each other again: ‘We looked at each other, Brandi jumped out of her seat, and we started running toward each other,’ she said. 

‘We embraced and wouldn’t let go of each other, hugging and crying.’

Brandi, who lives in Colorado, is now a leader in the 1 Billion Acts of Peace Campaign, which encourages people around the world to log actions that promote peace and compassion. 

On Mother’s Day, she shared photos with both her adoptive mother, Gail Brown, and with Barr, writing about ‘the amazing women who helped shape me.’

Barr’s other children include Jessica, 50, Jennifer, 49, and Jake, 47—all from her marriage to Pentland—and Buck, 30, whom she shares with Tom Arnold.

The reveal comes after Barr deflected accountability for her career-ending Tweet in a new interview. 

In 2018, Barr’s  shocking 2am comment about former Barack Obama advisor Valerie Jarrett directly resulted in the cancellation of her ‘Roseanne’ reboot, with network bosses condemning her Tweet as ‘abhorrent’ and ‘repugnant.’

Barr has previously claimed that she was under the influence of alcohol and Ambien when she posted the controversial tweets, before ultimately leaving the platform. 

Now, Barr reflected on the controversy, sharing in a recent interview with Variety that ‘God’ told her to write the Tweet. 

‘The way I feel about it is God told me to do what I did, and it was a nuclear bomb,’ the Roseanne alum stated.

Barr also called the Tweet a ‘perfect caption.’ She told the outlet that she was unaware Jarrett, who was involved in Obama’s 2015 Iran nuclear deal, is Black. 

Roseanne said she was ‘having nightmares’ about reprising her role on the ABC show until ‘God woke [her] up.’

‘I had my laptop there in bed, as always, and I opened it, and there was [a post with] a picture of Valerie Jarrett next to Helena Bonham Carter in full makeup as Ari in “Planet of the Apes,” and they looked like Xerox copies of each other, so I captioned it.’ 

She also denied that the tweet was racist.

‘[Other people] were so racist that they thought my tweet said Black people look like monkeys when it was about ‘Planet of the Apes,’ which is a movie about fascism,’ Barr said.

‘[Screenwriter] Rod Serling himself said it’s about the Jews in Germany. It is not a movie about Black people.’

The comedian added that ‘over 2 million Americans Googled Valerie Jarrett and the Iran deal’ afterward.

‘That was my intent. So whatever,’ she quipped.

Barr has previously claimed that she was under the influence of alcohol and Ambien when she posted the controversial tweets, before ultimately leaving the platform.

The viral tweet led to the cancellation of her show Roseanne, though it later returned as The Conners, without Barr.

Her character was killed off by an opioid overdose.