Exclusive

RHOA Fight: Cynthia Bailey Reveals Which Team She's On

The reality star talks about her friendship with NeNe Leakes and the big RHOA reunion fight

By Chris Harnick Apr 28, 2014 8:53 PMTags
The Real Housewives of AtlantaWilford Harewood/Bravo

Talk about being caught in the middle!

Cynthia Bailey was front and center in the melee at the Real Housewives of Atlanta reunion—sitting between Porsha Williams and Kenya Moore when the two got in it.'

So what's her take?

"Porsha was not attacked in my opinion, she was provoked," Bailey told E! News. "And you have to make choices about how you want to deal with that. The reunion is provocative. We know why we're there—we know there's going to be hard questions. We know we're going to be offended, insulted. We're ready for all that stuff, that's what makes the show. But you fight with yours words. And when you make another choice…then that's your choice.

Bailey said Williams knew she was going to be put in a situation where she was going to be provoked. "Had Kenya done that to me, I would have simply said, 'Look, either the props go or I go. I'm not going to sit here and try to talk over a bullhorn and I'm not going to allow someone to point a scepter in my face when I'm trying to speak,'" she said. "But she made her decision and it is what it is."

Bailey said she has not declared a side in the ongoing battle between the two women, but knows exactly which team she's on.

"At the end of the day, the fight was crazy, it happened really quickly and I think both of them could have gotten really hurt. So I was concerned for both of them, but when everyone ran to Porsha, I decided to go check on Kenya because no one went to her and she was the one who was actually attacked in the fight," she said. "And that doesn't mean I'm Team Kenya, it means I'm Team Right Thing To Do."

 Bailey also told E! News she's not really feeling the love for RHOA co-star NeNe Leakes.

"NeNe and I were friends, we'd been friends for four years now. Emotionally, I still love her, however our friendship went through a lot this season," Bailey told E! News. "And as optimistic as I was about trying to salvage it, in the end it just seems healthier just to move on."

Wilford Harewood/Bravo

Bailey said she was open to patching things up at the reunion, but all that's changed. "I felt that if she wanted to have a real, sincere conversation and was open to apologizing for certain things and made me feel comfortable, then yeah, I was open to it," she said. "But after seeing her Watch What Happens Live interview, that was a turning point for me. I have no interest in being friends with her. It's done as far as I'm concerned."

In the interview, Leakes discussed who she thinks should be let go from the long-running hit reality show. "I think Cynthia is OK," Leakes told Andy Cohen. "It's not like she's really bringing anything to the show."

"It was very hurtful. It made me feel like maybe we were never really friends," Bailey told us. "I would be very surprised for her to come to and try to make this right. I'm prepared to move on."

—Reporting by Beth Sobol

(E! and Bravo are both part of the NBCUniversal family).