Though Todd and Julie Chrisley no longer have their USA reality show Chrisley Knows Best to fall back on, with the cable network canceling the reality series following the couple’s respective prison sentences being announced, they are still dependably putting out new episodes of their podcast Chrisley Confessions. And in the latest installment, the family patriarch formally addressed the ongoing issue of Chloe’s birth mother making demands and claims about regaining custody of the child, saying he and his wife are the only ones with legal ground to stand on.
The podcast episode titled “Faith Over Fear, Tabloid Rumors, and God's Time not Todd's Time” wasted no time in getting down to brass tacks regarding Chloe’s birth mother Angela Johnson speaking out about her attempts to regain custody. Having previously released a statement through their lawyer, Todd Chrisley laid out the strangeness in Johnson’s timing, claiming that the mother and daughter hadn’t been in communication for years on end. In his words:
It’s ironic that her biological mother would come forward now when she has not been in her life since 2015, and Angela Johnson surrendered her parental rights [in] March of 2017, and we never heard from her again. Chloe was legally adopted by myself and by Julie, and she is legally our child. And we will be the ones who decide, if and when the time comes, as to who will be her caregiver. We’re not going to discuss who that’s going to be because we don’t owe that to the world, and that’s our private matters. At the end of the day, Chloe’s family is who Chloe has been raised with.
While the Chrisleys haven’t been so public themselves about plans for Chloe after they enter the prison system, daughter Savannah Chrisley spoke to the idea of being the guardian for both Chloe and the teenaged Grayson. That said, her comments were made prior to sentencing and thus before Angela Johnson made her claims.
Todd Chrisley continued his argument, saying:
Angela Johnson literally surrendered her rights to her child. She did this in front of a judge. The judge explained to her, ‘You understand what you’re doing? You understand that you’re surrendering the rights of your child?' And then explained that she had X amount of days to come back in and rescind that.
It would appear that Johnson did not return to the courtroom for such reasons, but had made clear during the judge’s questioning that she wasn’t being threatened or coerced into giving up Chloe, and wasn’t being paid anything as compensation for it.
The reality star doubled down on the custody rights situation and explained why they aimed to become Chloe’s guardian in the first place following a joint custody phase. According to Todd Chrisley:
But just so that the record is very, very clear: Angela Johnson has no rights to Chloe. Her rights were terminated. She has been legally adopted. And I have read some of the comments that said, ‘Sweetie, you waited ten years too late.’ That is correct. . . . We tried to do the right thing with Angela. We provided her housing for her to get on her feet at some point when she was homeless. I did not want to have to say to Chloe when she was 18 years old that I allowed her mother to be in the streets. I did not owe this to her mother. I did not owe this to go out and provide housing for her.
Chrisley said the stipulations for the condo were such that Johnson only needed to stay current with monthly payments, and the condo would have become Chloe’s property upon reaching the age of 18. But she allegedly did not make said payments. As well, Chrisley stated Johnson was also given a Toyota Prius and the funding for nursing school tuition, but she purportedly did not make efforts to complete the schooling, and also wasn’t dependable when it came to driving to pick Chloe up when it was Johnson’s time to take her.
And when it comes to having receipts to show as proof, Chrisley spoke directly to Johnson through the podcast, saying he knows she’s listening.
What you need to do is understand that I have retained every text message, and so has Julie, with any communication that we’ve ever had with you. We have not released those, but if we need to, we will. That’s just drawing our line in the sand. You have had no relationship with Chloe. She does not have any relationship with you.
Even beyond all of the issues relating directly to Chloe, Todd Chrisley said he and others have been receiving letters and emails from other men that Johnson has had children with, where the fathers are reportedly asking for help in gaining their own custody rights. To be expected, the former reality star is not interested in dealing with Johnson’s troubles with others.
At this time, the Chrisleys are still expected to be appealing their prison sentences, though it’s impossible to know how things will go between now and the points when Todd and Julie are expected to be incarcerated.
