Rosie O’Donnell engaged, wedding date ‘long time in the future’

The third time’s the charm for Rosie O’Donnell.

On Monday, the 56-year-old actress confirmed to People magazine that she’s engaged to Elizabeth Rooney, a 33-year-old police officer and Army veteran, after a year-long courtship.

O’Donnell and Rooney went public as a couple in November 2017, and have been in a long-distance relationship with O’Donnell living in New York and Rooney in Boston.

Rooney is more than 20 years younger than O’Donnell, with O’Donnell admitting that sometimes fans confuse her new fiancee with her 20-year-old daughter Chelsea.

“A lot of people say, ‘Oh my God, Chelsea looks so great,’” she said. “I’m like, ‘That’s not Chelsea.’ That’s my soon-to-be spouse.’ It’s a little tricky. In the airport people say, ‘Rosie, can I have a picture of you and your daughter?’ She doesn’t seem to think it’s an issue at all. Nobody ever does, but I do sometimes.”

O’Donnell noted Rooney is not fazed by their age difference.

“I keep telling her I’m too old for her,” she said. “But she doesn’t seem to care. She’s like, ‘I was in the Army! I put my life on the line every day you think I don’t know who I want to date?’ I’m like, ‘Alright I guess that’s true.’ She has a lot of good points.”

O’Donnell added that their wedding date is “a long time in the future.”

O’Donnell has been married twice before. In 2004, she wed Kelli Carpenter, but they separated in 2007. She was later married to Michelle Rounds from 2012 to 2015. Rounds died in 2017 of an apparent suicide.

Maeve McDermott, USA TODAY

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