It may not be the best days of Ariana Madix’s life, but she is getting through just fine thanks to the support of friends and family. Vanderpump Rules fans at large have also rallied around the reality TV star. No one predicted that Tom Sandoval and Raquel Leviss were hooking up since the summer of 2022. But did anyone know about it before the news broke earlier this month?
VPR alum Kristen Doute made a claim on her Sex, Love and What Else Matters podcast last week. According to Us Weekly, she suspected that Sandoval’s BFF Tom Schwartz knew of the affair “a month ago.” And left it to the cheating duo to sort themselves out and come clean to Ariana.
Kristen revealed, “Schwartz only found out about it a month ago,” and that she and the Schwartz & Sandy’s co-founder were “texting yesterday” about the affair. This would mean that Schwartz knew that Sandoval and Raquel were hooking up in early February.
Kristen claimed that Katie Maloney’s ex-husband told Sandoval to take responsibility. She continued, “[Schwartz] said that he told [Sandoval] he needed to tell Ariana before it blew up in his face and humiliated the hell out of her … Too little too late.”
Despite the uncomfortable situation of their meeting, Kristen and Ariana are now good friends. Kristen dated Sandoval from 2007 to 2013, before he cheated on her with Ariana. So the friends were together at TomTom when Ariana found a sexually explicit video of Raquel on Sandoval’s phone.
Kristen described what went down, “During Tom [Sandoval’s] performance, his phone fell out of his pocket or something and somebody — a mutual friend — picks up his phone, hands it to Ariana. Ariana had his phone and she told me that she just had this gut intuition to look at it.”
Despite being “a trusting couple” (at the time anyway), and Ariana calling Tom “dedicated” shortly before the scandal surfaced, Ariana “just felt like she had to look.” Kristen explained, “So she went into his photos. He had screen recorded a FaceTime of him and Raquel masturbating with each other. That’s the truth.”
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With no reason to hide now, Raquel has been “saying that [she and Sandoval] are in love and they have matching necklaces,” Kristen claimed. She also said that Sandoval was “gaslighting” Ariana and “blaming” her for not being “supportive” of his “endeavors.” According to Kristen, Tom told his ex-girlfriend, “You know we haven’t been happy.”
Needless to say, Kristen is Team Ariana. She shared a video on Instagram to support her friend. “I stan Ariana. This is in real-time. I love you so much.”
Some fans pointed out that VPR alum should feel vindicated. After all, Ariana smooched with Sandoval when he was with Kristen. Yet, she gets no satisfaction from Tom and Raquel’s disgraceful behavior.
Kristen took to her Instagram Story earlier to clarify. She said, “I don’t know why I feel like I need to make this clear, but there’s so many people right now wondering if this is making me happy. And you guys, Ariana and I’ve been really good friends for many, many years now. So, I am Team Ariana— all day, every day. That’s what’s up.” She added, “Karma is indeed coming. So Raquel should just move home.”
The Pump Rules cast dating history is an intricate web. Kristen moved on from Sandoval with DJ James Kennedy. Kristen and James ended their relationship in September 2015. He started dating Raquel and introduced her to the VPR cast. Thanks, James! Sandoval added $25,000K to the budget when James proposed to the beauty pageant queen in May 2021. She called it off in December 2021.
Since then, Raquel has been on a self-proclaimed journey of sexual liberation and self-actualization. It ended the way it did. Raquel fled LA and issued a statement apologizing to Ariana.
TELL US- DO YOU THINK SCHWARTZ KNEW ABOUT THE AFFAIR A MONTH PRIOR? SHOULD HE HAVE WARNED ARIANA? SHOULD KRISTEN FEEL VINDICATED BY ARIANA BEING CHEATED ON? WHAT DO YOU THINK OF ALL THE PAST VPR HOOKUPS?
[Photo Credit: Charles Sykes/Bravo]
