Vanessa Hudgens calls out paparazzi for invading her family’s privacy after giving birth

‘We’re disappointed that our family’s privacy was disrespected and exploited,’ Hudgens wrote

Vanessa Hudgens attends the 2024 Vanity Fair Oscar party, hosted By Radhika Jones, at Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts on March 11, 2024, in Beverly Hills, California (Amy Sussman/Getty Images)

Vanessa Hudgens called out the paparazzi for invading the privacy of her family as they left the hospital after she gave birth.

On her Instagram Story, the 35-year-old High School Musical alum criticized photographers for publishing photos that revealed that she had just given birth to her first child, adding that they had violated her family’s privacy as soon as they set foot outside of the hospital. She wrote: “We’re disappointed that our family’s privacy was disrespected and exploited during this very special time due to the greed of a long lens camera feeding the media.”

However, the actor noted that their family was happy with the arrival of their latest addition, concluding her post: “Despite all of that, mom dad and baby are happy and healthy.”

TMZ was the first to report that Hudgens's baby had given birth, publishing photos of the actor, her husband Cole Tucker, and their newborn child leaving the hospital.

While co-hosting ABC’s Countdown to Oscars: On the Red Carpet Live! in March, ThePrincess Switch star debuted her baby bump in a body-hugging, black turtleneck Vera Wang Couture gown. The red carpet confirmation came amid Hudgens denying pregnancy rumors as far back as October 2023. Internet users began speculating that she was pregnant after she shared pictures from her bachelorette trip to Aspen.

At the time, one user wrote: “Why does she look pregnant to me or like she’s trying to hide a bump,” prompting Hudgens to reply: “Not pregnant so y’all can stop.”

The newborn is not only the actor’s first baby but also the actor’s first child with her husband, Colorado Rockies baseball player Cole Tucker, with who she tied the knot in December 2023 in a ceremony with 100 of their friends and family in Tulum, Mexico. She met Tucker through a Zoom meditation seminar hosted by Joe Jonas during the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020. Later that year, in November, the pair were spotted holding hands, and the following year, they made their relationship social media official.

“I got a girlfriend and she’s cool. She’s awesome, I love her,” he revealed to reporters while at spring training for his former team, the Pittsburgh Pirates. “But I don’t want it to be, ‘Oh, Cole’s dating Vanessa …’ I don’t want it to be treated any differently than Mitch [Keller] having his wife down, or Ke’Bryan [Hayes] having his girlfriend come down. She’s great. She’ll be around. You will see her, but you saw the headline, it is what it is.”

In December 2022, the pair got engaged after two years of dating, with Hudgens commemorating the happy news with an Instagram post of her diamond ring.

“I knew,” the actor admitted in an April 2023 interview with Today. “After our first weekend together, I called my sister and was like: ‘I think I just found my future husband.’”

Hudgens has always wanted to be a mother, admitting to Nylon in September 2022 that when she was younger she thought she was going to get married and have children earlier.

“I always thought I would be married at 25 because that’s when my mom got married, and then when that didn’t happen, I was like: ‘Oh, okay, so we’re just going to shift everything back a bit,’” she told the outlet. “I always thought that around 36, 37 is when I would want to have kids, and that still plays. I don’t feel panicked about it.”

Before marrying Tucker, Hudgens famously dated High School Musical costar Zac Efron from 2006 to 2010, and later dated Dune: Part 2 star Austin Butler for nine years before calling it quits in January 2020.