The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives star Jordan Ngatikaura broke his silence about wife Jessi Ngatikaura’s affair with Marciano Brunette in a tense new interview with Nick Viall.
During the Wednesday, November 26, episode of the “Viall Files” podcast, Nick, 45, sat down with Jordan, 30, to ask about Jessi’s claims of emotional abuse and their marriage overall, which was a main story line on season 3 of the Hulu hit.
“My plan is just to focus on my family. All these people online can chirp all day. There’s going to be people that hate me and there’s gonna be people that hate her,” Jordan said. “There’s going to be a really big broad spectrum of what people think about what they’ve been able to see. “I think the best thing that I can do in that instead of being pissed off, it’s to remember that that’s in the past. What we’re doing now is what matters and turning into one another and not away from one another.”
Jordan added that it was “really eye-opening” for him to watch the show back and see his own behavior.
As Mormon Wives viewers know, Jessi admitted to kissing Marciano, 32, after meeting him during a stint on Vanderpump Villa in 2024. She also revealed that they carried on a texting relationship, but denied having sex with him. Jessi’s admission of her affair came on the heels of exposing cracks in her marriage to Jordan, with whom she shares kids Jagger, 5, and Jovi, 2,
While Jordan continued to acknowledge his mistakes in his marriage with Jessi 33, on “Viall Files,” his decision to keep bringing up Jessi’s affair with Marciano during the interview appeared to frustrate the podcast host. They ultimately weren’t able to see each other’s point of view before the podcast came to an end.
Keep scrolling for the biggest revelations from Jordan’s solo — and joint conversation with Jessi — about the ups and downs in his marriage:
Jordan Makes Rare Comment About His Wife Before Jessi
Before exchanging vows with Jessi in 2020, Jordan was married to someone else and became a young father, something he believes happened because of a lack of sexual education.
“I essentially lost my virginity and had my daughter at 18 years old and, basically, had a shotgun wedding,” he shared. “Very soon after we got married, we realized she wanted to do the whole Mormon route.”
Jordan didn’t have the same Mormon beliefs as his wife, which created a “feminine wound” for him. He denied ever calling her names, something Jessi has accused him of in his current marriage.
Jordan Claims Jessi ‘Emotionally Abandoned’ Him
Jordan shared that he felt “emotionally abandoned” by Jessi after her hair business, JZ Styles, commanded her attention. He had to give up his job, which previously required him to be in California four months out of the year, and that made Jordan even more resentful at times of Jessi’s success.
“I think she’s starting to understand [how emotionally abandoned I felt before the affair],” he added on Wednesday. “But not fully.”
Elsewhere in the podcast, he expressed frustration with how Jessi went about discussing her affair on screen and continuing to communicate with Marcinao during season 3 of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. He spoke about a specific scene where he confronted Jessi for inviting Marcinao to dinner with the group following a lie detector test.
“What I said [on the show] was, ‘What are you going to tell [our kids]? That you cheated on me? And then you went to go to a lie detector with the guy you had an affair with’?” he said. “In that moment, I stand by that. I wish that that didn’t happen. I think it was a poor choice.”
Jordan continued: “Jessi wasn’t present during that. I mean, you could see it on her face. She was numb. She wasn’t even there. No one was home.”
Jordan Isn’t Ruling Out a Future Divorce From Jessi
Jessi Draper. Nick Viall/YouTube
During her half of the interview, Jessi spoke about past attempts to file for divorce from Jordan before ultimately agreeing to work on their issues. Jordan, for his part, revealed he previously told Jessi’s dad that divorce would not be on the table “I just remember one of the things that I promised him was that divorce was not an option for me,” he said. “I don’t want to do this with that ever even being an option. This is it.”
Now, Jordan’s tune appeared to change in the aftermath of her affair.
“I told Jessi that if it ever gets like that again [with our marriage], I don’t want anything to do with this relationship either,” he noted. “For her sake, for my kid’s sake and for my own sake.”
Jordan and Jessi Are Not on the Same Page About Affair Details
Jessi previously claimed that Jordan told her to lie and say they were separated if her affair ever came to light. Jordan initially denied his wife’s claims. “In the moment, I think that’s what she decided to say,” he alleged to Nick.
Jessi, who was back for this segment of the podcast, continued to explain her POV.
“I remembered you saying that and I was like, ‘I think this is what he’ll want me to say.’ Because if that was the case, I would go with the narrative now. I want people to know the truth,’’ she stated.
Jordan then acknowledged how Jessi may have gotten this impression. , “It’s to protect yourself, too. What I’m saying is I was spitballing ideas,” he said. “At the time, I felt so betrayed that I was like, ‘Well, maybe me saying something like that will comfort her.’”
Jordan also addressed Jessi’s claims that her husband was blackmailing her about the affair.
“The reason I left was because we had been dealing with the affair for about six months behind closed doors. No one knew. During those six months, it got worse than it ever had. He was blackmailing me. He was threatening to send my texts out to Marciano to the world,” she claimed on the podcast, noting that it was addressed on the show but didn’t make the final edit. “Anytime I did anything he didn’t agree with, he had it on his TikTok drafts and he was like, ‘I’m going to post it.’”
Jessi called things “so toxic” She explained: “I remember the day I left him, it got to a point where he was recording me and he’s taunting me and I was chasing him around the house. We were just screaming at each other. It was so bad.”
Jordan admitted to some of the behavior.
“I actually never meant it. It was just to cry for help,” he claimed. “Hurt people, hurt people. I was literally just trying to like, ‘Be sorry for what you did. Be sorry [and] love me. I’m anxious over here. Give me something.’”
Where Jessi and Jordan Stand With Demi
Jessi’s affair came on the heels of her costar Demi Engemann being accused of hooking up with Marciano. Demi denied the claims but Marciano has since alleged that Demi urged him to bring up his emotional affair with Jessi to take the heat off her.
”[Her behavior is], probably, one of the most disgusting and vile things that I’ve ever seen a human being do,” Jordan said about Demi allegedly using Jessi’s affair to push a story line on the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. “I want to know what must have gone on in her life to make her feel justified or that that was OK. It honestly is disgusting to me.”
Jordan also confirmed that he was no longer close with Demi’s husband, Bret Engemann, after things got too awkward. Jessi later revealed that she hadn’t spoken to Demi outside of their season 3 scenes.
“During season 3 — when this was all unfolding — our only conversations were on camera. There was that one sit down we had in a restaurant. It was the first time we spoke,” she detailed. “I remember going into it pretty heated and she completely turned it on me and was like, ‘You’re victim shaming [over my claims of sexual misconduct against Marciano].’ At the time I was like, ‘I’m going to look terrible. I have to give into this because if people take her side or the audience believes her, I’m going to look bad.’”
She added: “So I just gave in. That’s why you see us leave on somewhat OK terms. Because I was like, ‘How the hell am I going to fight with victim shaming?’”
Marciano has denied all of Demi’s claims of sexual misconduct.
Nick vs. Jordan Get Involved in Awkward Back and Forth
Jordan Ngatikaura, Nick Viall, and Jessi Ngatikaura. Getty Images (3)
By the end of the podcast, things took an awkward turn when Nick tried to get more of a reaction from Jordan regarding Jessi’s claims of emotional abuse.
“Listen, people cheat for all different reasons. But I feel like sometimes there’s past trauma,” Nick said, to which Jordan replied, “So it sounds like you’re making an excuse for it.”
After Nick said that he understood Jessi’s side, Jordan fired back with, “But do you get the position I was in? I tried to explain that. Maybe it didn’t come across well.”
After Nick tried to explain why he felt bad for Jessi in the situation, Jordan seemingly backed down.
“There is no excuse for it. To answer your question very directly, yes [I feel like I was in the wrong],” Jordan said. “I think my brain might have made up what you were saying.”
Nick still felt Jordan wasn’t taking full accountability.
“I’m not making excuses for Jessi but I get it. I get why she felt so trapped and so lost and so alone,” he replied. “Man-to-man, it was your job. Whatever she did to you or however you felt unsupported, more than anything it’s your job to make her feel safe.”
In response, Jordan pointed out that they were both still works in progress, concluding, “During that time, that’s what I was trying to do. But I think it was too far gone at that time, genuinely.”
