Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes traded in friends for love.
The couple and former ABC News anchors revealed on the June 12 episode of their iHeartRadio podcast that nearly all of their former colleagues stopped talking to them after their secret relationship was exposed in November 2022.
“We went back to work for two days after that tabloid that shall not be named released those photos of — as we pointed out — just discovering us in a private relationship,” Robach, 51, said on the episode, which was filmed in front of a live audience.
“They did not catch us cheating. That is not what happened,” she added. “They found us in our private relationship.”
“But when we came back for those two days, we were surrounded with support,” Robach recalled. “My dressing room was full of all of our colleagues.”
Holmes, 46, interjected to say that their former colleagues were being “fake” when they showed support. “Some of it was BS,” he said.
Robach continued: “But once it was clear we weren’t coming back, I never heard from most people again.”
“And we get that to a certain degree,” Holmes noted. “Everybody’s trying to hold onto their job. They don’t wanna be seen as being an ally of the two people that ABC News doesn’t like. We get it to a certain degree. We stayed away from some of our former colleagues because we were worried about them.”
In November 2022, photos surfaced showing Robach and Holmes holding hands in a car while vacationing in upstate New York. The two were also seen canoodling in a bar.
As their relationship generated headlines, ABC decided to suspend the two from their anchor chairs on “GMA3,” the third hour of “Good Morning America.”
In January 2023, they were fired following a company investigation into their romance. The public thought Holmes and Robach were married to their respective partners, Marilee Fiebig and Andrew Shue, at the time, but they’ve denied committing infidelity.
Robach and Shue finalized their divorce in March 2023, while Holmes and Fiebig divorced in October. Both ex-couples had gotten married in 2010.
On their podcast, Holmes revealed that the couple recently got lunch with “GMA” anchor Michael Strahan, who assured them that they don’t need to apologize for feeling guilty about who they’re seen with.
“We are trying to protect you, Strahan, from us. That’s the shame I’m talking about,” said Holmes. “This is a guy we’ve been very close to for 10 years now. And even we didn’t want to get whatever our stank is on him for some reason. We’ve struggled to get out of that mindset, but friends like that do help. And time helps.”
Robach added: “I used to say: It’s not like I murdered someone, but I definitely felt that’s how it seemed if you read comments anywhere from these articles.”
She continued, “I will say, when we did walk down the streets, which we didn’t often, we got a lot of people yelling support. I wanna definitely say that. No one came up and said something horrible to our faces. But it was all the comments and all the commentary and all the headlines. It weighs you down to the point where you think, ‘I’m the worst person in the world.’ And you do feel like you committed a crime. It’s bizarre.”
Robach said it felt “strange to be suddenly this hated” and treated like a “horrible person” because she was in love with Holmes.
“It was frustrating too because the narrative wasn’t true.”
Robach and Holmes laid low for a little bit after they lost their jobs at ABC. But now, they’re sharing everything about their relationship on their podcast that they launched in December 2023.
However, they’ve refused to comment on the fact that both their exes, Shue and Fiebig, are now dating.
