‘RHORI’s Rulla Says Jo-Ellen ‘Can’t Be Trusted’ After Heated Confrontation (Exclusive)

The Real Housewives of Rhode Island star Rulla Nehme Pontarelli isn’t holding out hope for reconciliation with Jo-Ellen Tiberi.

Following a heated confrontation between the two women during Sunday’s episode of RHORI over accusations involving Rulla’s husband, Brian Pontarelli, and an alleged affair, Rulla opened up to PopCulture.com about trying to take the “higher road” with her castmate while handling “negative energy” in her marriage.

“I have certainly tried to just take the higher road and be the bigger person, knowing everything that she’s done to me and my husband [and] my family behind the scenes with the group, and even with people in her town and the state,” Rulla said of Jo-Ellen. “I probably shouldn’t have, but again, just being the person that I am in order to keep the peace, I’ve tried to take the high road.”

“But unfortunately, you know, it’s sad. Some people just can’t be trusted,” she continued. “Some people’s cores will never change. And I think that’s what we’re going to begin to see [on RHORI].”

Rulla and Jo-Ellen went head-to-head in Sunday’s episode after Jo-Ellen accused Brian of contacting her workplace to get her in trouble for accusing him of being unfaithful to his wife. While Brian did admit that he had spoken to one of Jo-Ellen’s colleagues about the “gossip” she had supposedly been spreading, he insisted it was not to “get her fired” but just to “have her stop saying certain things” about him.

Rulla told PopCulture that she had “nothing to do with any phone call about anyone’s job,” saying that she felt Jo-Ellen had “turned it into, ‘You threatened my family, and you threatened my job, and I’m going to come after you.’”

“Who says that?” she asked. “What woman with a family and children comes at someone like that?”

As the season progresses, Rulla told PopCulture that “the viewers will get to understand a little bit more” and would “hopefully think differently” about her and her situation, “and maybe also feel with [her] a little bit more.”

When it comes to her marriage today, Rulla said that while reliving the rough patch in her marriage was “definitely the hardest part” of filming, she and Brian are “in a much different place today than we were then and then we were before prior to filming.”

“Being in the limelight certainly takes a toll, in addition to just having this type of situation going on behind the scenes,” she continued of the rumors surrounding her marriage. “I think viewers will get to see a little bit more of the situation play out, and then when we actually get to the reunion, they will see and learn even more. So I am looking forward to that.”

She continued, “My husband and I have worked together as we always have in the past to get through any particular issue. We really have never had … any major issues in our relationship. Right now, it’s just fending off negative energy.”

The Real Housewives of Rhode Island airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on Bravo and streams the next day on Peacock.