Levi Johnston’s long custody battle against Bristol Palin is finally over. The exes have reached a custody agreement over their son, Tripp Johnston, seven years after Levi Johnston first filed suit against his former high school sweetie, according to E! News .
Johnston posted a lengthy message on Facebook about the end of his custody struggles with Sarah Palin’s oldest daughter. Levi wrote that he wanted to post a personal message rather than have his words “twisted in an interview.”
I’m so happy to have my son in my life, and to put all of this back in forth in the courts behind me. It might have taken me 7 years and cost me around $100,000 in lawyer fees, spread out among 3 different lawyers, as well as a lot of patience, but it was all worth it…I’m happy now to be successfully co-parenting.
Seven years after Tripp’s birth, Levi Johnston wins custody battle against Bristol Palin. https://t.co/i9WIbPuDOj pic.twitter.com/AAgUhH9Rvo
— E! News (@enews) February 24, 2016
In his post, Levi admitted that he owes some back child support. But the dad of three (Johnston has two daughters with his wife Sunny Oglesby) made it clear that he has always been there for his son Tripp, despite the bad rap he’s gotten in the media in the past.
Although I do owe some back child support, altogether I have paid $50,000 in child support for Tripp, which is $600 a month, since Tripp’s birth so at the end of the day I know I have worked hard to meet my obligations as a father. Despite what some have heard I’ve always been there for him, and I go to almost every school event that I can and spend all of my free time with my kids. Right now life is really looking up for our family.”
Levi Johnston also encouraged fathers to “never give up on fighting” for custody and to keep their kids in their lives. Levi’s own custody battle started in 2009, when he claimed the Palin family was making it difficult for him to see his son. Levi and Bristol’s first child custody stipulation was never finalized, and then the case was dismissed. According to Us Weekly , in 2013 Johnston filed a petition for equal custody of his son, but Bristol’s lawyers told the press that Levi owed a whopping $66,000 in child support at the time.
But even before his lengthy custody battle, Johnston had a long, strange trip with the Palin clan. Levi Johnston penned a 2009 Vanity Fair article in which he claimed tha t Sarah Palin wanted to keep her daughter’s pregnancy a secret and offered to adopt the baby once he was born. Johnston alleged that the former Alaska governor was relentless about her plan.
Sarah told me she had a great idea: we would keep it a secret— nobody would know that Bristol was pregnant. She told me that once Bristol had the baby she and Todd would adopt him. That way, she said, Bristol and I didn’t have to worry about anything. Sarah kept mentioning this plan. She was nagging—she wouldn’t give up. She would say, ‘So, are you gonna let me adopt him?’ We both kept telling her we were definitely not going to let her adopt the baby. I think Sarah wanted to make Bristol look good, and she didn’t want people to know that her 17-year-old daughter was going to have a kid.
Johnston and his ex-fiance also had a war of words in their memoirs. In Levi’s 2011 book Deer in the Headlights: My Life in Sarah Palin’s Crosshairs , he wrote that Bristol actually wanted to get pregnant because her mom was pregnant with son Trig at the time. But in her own book, Not Afraid of Life: My Journey So Far . Bristol claimed that her virginity had been “stolen” by Levi during a drunken campout.
Following Levi Johnston’s post about their custody battle, Bristol a photo of herself and her two kids on Instagram (in addition to Tripp, she has a newborn daughter, Sailor) and reiterated that she didn’t “lose” the custody case. She also wrote that she has never kept her children from their fathers—and never will.
I have never, and will never, keep them from having a positive relationship with their fathers. I did not ‘lose’ any custody case – my son has always spent most of his time with me and he will continue to do so, he is happy, healthy, and knows both of his parents love him.
Check out the video below for more on Levi Johnston’s custody battle.
[Photo By Michael N. Todaro/Getty Images]