Entertainment- John Stamos defended Lori Loughlin's involvement in the college admissions scandal.
- He told Dax Shepard on "Armchair Expert" she "didn't know what was going on."
"Full House" star John Stamos defended his former on-screen wife Lori Loughlin's involvement in the college admissions scandal on Dax Shepard's podcast "Armchair Expert," saying she "didn't know what was going on" at the time.
Near the 42-minute mark of the conversation, which dropped on Monday, Shepard, his cohost Monica Padman, and Stamos spoke about how much they loved Loughlin.
Stamos revealed that he and his former costar had talked the night before about recent comments Shepard made on his show. In an earlier episode, the host admitted that discussing Loughlin on his podcast in the wake of the 2019 college admissions scandal has been difficult.
"It was something you were saying, like, 'I hate it when people bring her up,'" said Stamos. "Because if you defend her then people get mad and if you don't defend her you feel bad because she's a great person."
Shepard agreed, "I could just tell you what it was like to work with her. I found her to be so fucking lovely."
Stamos said Loughlin "paid a lot of money" as a result of her involvement in the college admissions scandal. He also said she "set up a college fund" for kids. "And she went to fucking jail, man," the actor and musician continued.
"I'm gonna say this and she said I could. She wasn't really the architect of any of it. She was in the way background. She really didn't know what was going on," Stamos added.
Loughlin and her husband Mossimo Giannulli paid $500,000 to guarantee their daughters Olivia Jade Giannulli and Isabella Giannulli admission to the University of Southern California, as reported by Insider's Kelly McLaughlin. For her part in the scandal, the "When Calls The Heart" star served a two-month prison sentence in 2020 at a medium-security federal correctional institution in Victorville, California.
On "Armchair Expert," Stamos joked that it should've been any other former "Full House" castmate who served time. He named the late Bob Saget, his former on-screen niece Jodi Sweetin, who has been open about her past addiction to drugs, and himself as options.
Shepard jumped in and criticized the general public for comparing Loughlin's punishment to that of Kelley Williams-Bolar, a Black single mother initially sentenced to five years in prison (later suspended to 10 days) for using her father's address to get her daughters into a better school district.
As reported by Insider, Loughlin was a part of Victorville's minimum-security camp, so though she wore a uniform she was also able to take classes like ceramics, spinning, and Pilates. She was also ordered to pay a $150,000 fine and complete 100 hours of community service.
Loughlin has since made her return to television as Abigail Stanton on the GAC show "When Hope Calls." The show is a spinoff of Hallmark's "When Calls The Heart." She will next appear on Candace Cameron Bure's network Great American Family in a romantic comedy set to air in January 2023.