Olivia Jade Giannulli is breaking her silence.
The 21-year-old influencer and daughter of Lori Loughlin spoke out on Tuesday in an interview on Red Table Talk, her first since the 2019 college admissions scandal. Her parents, Loughlin and fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, both pleaded guilty in the scandal after prosecutors said they paid $500,000 to get their daughters into college by having them falsely designated as crew team recruits.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Although she offered an apology for the scandal, saying "we messed up," she also admitted she didn't initially understand the outrage.
"My thoughts are completely different now, but I remember thinking, 'How are people mad about this?' ... I was like, 'I don't really understand what's wrong with this,'" she admitted. "But I didn't realize, at the time, that's privilege. I didn't put those two together. I was like, 'Well, this is what everybody does.'"
She expressed embarrassment that "I walked around my whole 20 years of life not realizing, 'You have insane privilege. You're like the poster child of white privilege, and you had no idea.'"
Jade, who lost sponsors in the wake of the scandal last year, said she doesn't "deserve pity" but asked for "a second chance to redeem myself," ending the interview by again expressing regret that she "took my privilege and all my blessings for granted" but saying she now hopes to "move forward and do better." Watch the full conversation below. Brendan Morrow
-
Wes Anderson: The Archives – ‘quirkfest’ celebrates the director’s ‘impeccable craft’The Week Recommends Retrospective at the Design Museum showcases 700 props, costumes and set designs from the filmmaker’s three-decade career
-
Is conscription the answer to Europe’s security woes?Today's Big Question How best to boost troop numbers to deal with Russian threat is ‘prompting fierce and soul-searching debates’
-
All My Sons: ‘epic and timeless’ theatre starring Bryan CranstonThe Week Recommends Ivo van Hove’s production of Arthur Miller’s classic play assumes the ‘grim yet towering momentum’ of a Greek tragedy
-
Hungary’s Krasznahorkai wins Nobel for literatureSpeed Read László Krasznahorkai is the author of acclaimed novels like ‘The Melancholy of Resistance’ and ‘Satantango’
-
Primatologist Jane Goodall dies at 91Speed Read She rose to fame following her groundbreaking field research with chimpanzees
-
Florida erases rainbow crosswalk at Pulse nightclubSpeed Read The colorful crosswalk was outside the former LGBTQ nightclub where 49 people were killed in a 2016 shooting
-
Trump says Smithsonian too focused on slavery's illsSpeed Read The president would prefer the museum to highlight 'success,' 'brightness' and 'the future'
-
Trump to host Kennedy Honors for Kiss, StalloneSpeed Read Actor Sylvester Stallone and the glam-rock band Kiss were among those named as this year's inductees
-
White House seeks to bend Smithsonian to Trump's viewSpeed Read The Smithsonian Institution's 21 museums are under review to ensure their content aligns with the president's interpretation of American history
-
Charlamagne Tha God irks Trump with Epstein talkSpeed Read The radio host said the Jeffrey Epstein scandal could help 'traditional conservatives' take back the Republican Party
-
CBS cancels Colbert's 'Late Show'Speed Read 'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert' is ending next year
