Olivia Jade Giannulli Reveals How She First Learned of Parents Lori Loughlin and Mossimo Giannulli’s Involvement in College Admissions Scandal

Olivia Jade Giannulli is breaking her silence less than two years after her parents, Lori Loughlin and Mossimo Giannulli, were accused of bribing her and her sister Isabella Rose Giannulli’s ways into college, playing a huge role in an even larger college admission scandal. Joining Jada Pinkett Smith, Willow Smith and Adrienne Banfield-Jones on their Facebook Watch show, Red Table Talk, Giannulli opened up about her experience through this very public scandal and the time when she first learned about what was going on. While it was a given the Smith family would make headlines for being the first to host such an interview, in the beginning, Banfield-Jones wasn’t thrilled to have the 21-year-old on as a guest because she was the “epitome of white privilege.”

“I just remember getting a call, and it was like, ‘Hey Liv, have you talked to your mom?’ and I was like, ‘No, why?’ and they were like, ‘I’ll just let you talk to her, and then call me back,’” Giannulli said, adding that was on spring break at that time when she received the phone call. Before she called her mom, she Googled her name first to see if she could figure out what was going on. “So I hang up the phone and I have this really weird gut feeling — I didn’t know what she was talking about. But I was just like, ‘I’m just gonna search my mom’s name up.’”

“Then, it’s everywhere,” she continued. “And I was sitting with a group of friends, and I knew any second everyone was gonna know too, if they didn’t already. And I remember just freezing and feeling so ashamed, I went home and hid myself for probably like three or four months. And school was still in session, I was technically, after spring break, I was going back to school and I felt so ashamed and embarrassed and although I didn’t a hundred percent understand what had just happened because there was a lot that, when I was applying I was not fully aware of what was going on, so when I got home I just felt so ashamed, I was like ‘I can’t go back, this is wrong.’”

Giannulli explained over and over again how much she learned through this process but did admit that at first was completely unaware of why people found it to be a big deal. She detailed the bubble she grew up in and that everyone around her did the same things, so she wasn’t sure why it elicited such outrage. Smith’s mom admitted to having a pretty hard time feeling compassionate towards her situation because of Jade’s white privilege, however, it was apparent that Giannulli realized the mistakes that had been made, which brought “joy” to Smith and her family.