Carole Radziwill’s former friendship with Ghislaine Maxwell and appearance in the Epstein files continues to be a source of tension with “The Real Housewives of New York City” castmate Sai De Silva.
On the Oct. 20 episode of Bravo’s reality series (Tuesdays, 8 p.m. ET/PT, streaming Wednesdays on Peacock) Radziwill confided in fellow housewife Erika Hammond about her frustration with De Silva.
“She was peppering me with questions, like as though I was a criminal,” Radziwill, 63, said, adding that she felt judged in the previous day’s conversation, which aired the week prior. “I was just like, so floored.”
Radziwill has said that though she was friends with Maxwell, she didn’t meet Jeffrey Epstein or hear about him from Maxwell. Epstein died in 2019
an apparent suicide, awaiting federal sex trafficking charges in New York’s Metropolitan Correctional Center. The wealthy financier was convicted in 2008 on Florida charges of soliciting and procuring a person under 18 for prostitution and avoided what could have been a lengthy prison sentence under a plea deal with then-U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta.
Maxwell, an accomplice of Epstein’s, is currently serving her 20-year sentence at Federal Prison Camp in Bryan, Texas, following a 2021 conviction of conspiracy to entice minors to travel to engage in illegal sex acts, conspiracy to transport minors to participate in illegal sex acts, transporting a minor to participate in illegal sex acts, sex trafficking conspiracy, and sex trafficking of a minor, per the Department of Justice.
In the previous episode of “RHONY,” which aired on Oct. 13, De Silva, 45, asked Radziwill several questions about her ties to Epstein after the journalist brought up headlines that noted her mention in the files. De Silva asked if she’d been to Epstein’s private island. (He purchased two in the U.S. Virgin Islands; Radziwill said she hadn’t.) De Silva asked where Radziwill and Maxwell met, for Radziwill to clarify her relationship with Maxwell, and why the two stopped talking.
“It’s like any friendship that sort of wasn’t that deep,” Radziwill explained of her relationship with the “social climber." She added, "We just kind of drifted apart."
De Silva continued to press the issue, saying that she thought the two "were very close," because the messages were "very jokey-jokey." When she realized she may have offended Radziwill, De Silva offered an apology, but emphasized that she needed "to know everything," especially as a mom to a teenage daughter.
“Do you think I’m part of an international sex trafficking ring? Are you worried about that?” Radziwill asked her costar flat-out, to which De Silva admitted, "I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking you what your affiliation [is]."
In this week's episode, Radziwill said she could understand being curious about someone’s past, citing a post from De Silva’s Substack in which she claimed a wealthy man, dubbed Daddy Warbucks, once gave her $10,000 cash to help with a move from New York to LA.
“Am I curious about Sai’s past? Sure I am,” Radziwill shared in a confessional. “Am I curious who Daddy Warbucks is and what she may or may not have done with Daddy Warbucks? Sure. Am I curious about whether she really was a bartender [at Scores New York strip club] or was she was up on the pole? Sure! Yes. But I’m not going to accuse her of it! I’m not going to insinuate anything.”
Radziwill later brought her feelings up to De Silva, while the two were alone at the beach. "I understand, listen, more than most. I was a reporter," she told De Silva. “If I knew someone who knew Ghislaine Maxwell, I would be curious and I’d ask questions and stuff."
“You said your side of the story,” De Silva said, taking accountability for how she "came in judging immediately."
Radziwill once again reiterated that she had no knowledge of the situation, explaining, "If I did know, I would be the first to tell everyone. And I did, when I found out, when she was charged and stuff."
Changing the subject, Radziwill asked De Silva about the customer known as Daddy Warbucks. De Silva ultimately chalked it up to a man in a "$133-million dollar Ponzi scheme" that she had no knowledge about. However, this didn't sit well with Radziwill.
"So you’re telling me that you had a very similar experience with Daddy Warbucks, not knowing that he was involved in some crime, as I had with Ghislaine Maxwell?" she said in a confessional of the situation's irony. "I don’t need to be judged by anybody and certainly not from somebody who had a very similar experience."
De Silva told Radziwill she’s right and Radziwill acknowledged that she was "glad we've cleared the air." But De Silva then doubled down once more, asking, “So you never went to this island?”
“No,” Radziwill emphasized, before elaborating in a confessional, “I feel this fire burning up inside. There’s a sensitivity chip missing.”
In a teaser of what remains for Season 16, De Silva and Radziwill appear to be civil before things escalate between them. “You were screaming my name like a lunatic,” Radziwill yells at De Silva in the preview.
“You, as a seasoned journalist,” De Silva tells Radziwill, with her finger pointed toward her, “should understand someone asking questions!"
While speaking with USA TODAY in August, Radziwill said she can “understand people's curiosity.”
“This is not something that I ever try to avoid,” she added. “So I kind of felt like it would come up on the show, and I was OK with it.”
“It's so different from what the public thinks about our friendship. I never considered her a really close friend,” Radziwill continued. “When I think about this, it's not about defending my reputation. I think anyone who looks at the story knows exactly what's going on. And people like to pick at the low-hanging fruit and somehow are blind to what's right in front of them. But I think about the victims that did not get the justice they deserve. I think about all the other young girls that are sexually assaulted every day, more than I think about who Ghislaine Maxwell knew or didn't know 20 years ago.”
Contributing: Doug Stanglin and Kevin McCoy, USA TODAY
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Carole Radziwill grilled over Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein ties on 'RHONY'
