While throwing shade at John Fuda‘s role on season 14, Tamra Judge and Teddi Mellencamp said the Real Housewives of New Jersey husband needed his own tagline — and Rachel Fuda delivered during an exclusive interview with Us Weekly.
Tamra, 56, and Teddi, 42, recapped episode two of RHONJ this week on their podcast, “Two Ts in a Pod,” getting into the fallout of Teresa Giudice calling John the “biggest drug dealer in Bergen County” in the premiere.
“Rachel tells Jen Fessler that it’s unfathomable how she wants to be Teresa’s friend. Jen says the entire group says crappy ugly things. John Fuda says he won’t associate with anybody who associates with Teresa. And then Jen Fessler thinks Teresa fights dirty. When you go low, she goes lower,” Teddi said. “Do you agree with Jen that everybody in the group says equally crappy things? Not just Teresa.”
“They all say crappy things,” Tamra replied. “It’s the nature of the show, but, obviously, there’s some people that go dirtier than others, but we all talk about each other.”
The RHOC star and RHOBH alum then dragged John, bringing it back to “friend of” Fessler sitting down with Teresa in episode two.
“John Fuda giving people an ultimatum about Teresa, like, at this point, give this man a tagline,” Teddi said.
Tamra declared that John is “not really in a position” to give ultimatums. “He’s definitely getting a little bit too involved,” she said. “I think he’s going to learn his lesson after the season not to get so involved. I’m sure he is getting a lot of s—t about that.”
While speaking with Us, Rachel defended her husband.
“Everyone can sit here and be like, ‘Oh, John’s the eighth housewife,’ whatever. Say what you want. But if you put the shoe on the other foot, what would you do different? You’re going to defend yourself,” Rachel told Us, alleging that the story line was “contrived” by “the other side” — a.k.a Teresa and her allies — before the season began. “As far as John having a tagline, what do you want the guy to do? They couldn’t find anything on me, so they went after him. Literally give him a tagline.”
When asked to write said tagline, Rachel didn’t hesitate and cited their Valet King business: “There’s only one king of New Jersey and his name’s John Fuda.”
Rachel went on to address why RHONJ is one the only Housewives franchises where the men get involved in the drama.
“In my specific instance, my husband, in my opinion, didn’t really have a choice. We walked into Jen Fessler’s party and that was it. I didn’t say anything except that [Teresa’s husband] Louie wasn’t a gentleman, and I didn’t even say those words, I just alluded to it,” Rachel told Us. “So I mean, it’s very specific to our franchise and I feel like it wouldn’t work on any other show, but I just think we all enjoy being around each other. The guys really kumbaya and everyone has a good time together.”
Rachel went on to cite Teresa’s endless history with sister-in-law Melissa Gorga and past unfounded claims about Jackie Goldschneider‘s husband.
“But there’s also this — I want to say ulterior motive — of copy and paste behavior of, ‘Let’s go after Joe. Let’s go after Evan. Let’s go after John.’ There’s a pattern here,” Rachel said. “And this is a very toxic behavior.”
The Real Housewives of New Jersey airs on Bravo Sundays at 8 p.m. ET.
