Bachelor Nation’s Ashley Iaconetti Calls ‘BS’ on Gerry, Theresa Split

Ashley Iaconetti doesn’t “buy” Golden Bachelor couple Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist blaming their divorce on long distance.

“I think a lot of the Good Morning America interview was BS because you don’t say, ‘We’re still in love with each other,’ and then get divorced. You just don’t,” Iaconetti, 36, said via her Instagram Stories on Friday, April 12. “If it’s a distance thing — at their age especially — live in Indiana, live in New Jersey, visit each other once or twice a month … Be in love, be married but, like, you know, commute to each other. I don’t buy [it]. I don’t buy that the moving thing is the reason they got divorced three months in.”

Iaconetti then explained why she wasn’t super surprised to learn about Turner, 72, and Nist, 70, ending their relationship following their wedding in January.

“When I came back from the Golden Wedding, my friend Naz [Perez] wanted me on the ‘I Don’t Get It’ podcast to talk about it and I said, ‘No, I can’t because I didn’t feel anything,’” she recalled after attending the season 1 couple’s nuptials at La Quinta Resort and Club in Palm Springs, California.

On April 12, Us Weekly confirmed Turner filed to dissolve their marriage in his hometown of Petersburg, Indiana, listing the same day as their date of separation. He cited the “irretrievable breakdown” of their marriage as the reason for the split.

Several hours earlier, Turner and Nist appeared on Good Morning America to confirm their breakup. The pair announced the news while holding hands and explained that their cross-country living situation led to the end of their relationship.

“Theresa and I have had a number of heart-to-heart conversations,” Turner said on Friday’s broadcast. “We’ve looked closely at our living situations and we’ve kind of come to the conclusion mutually that it’s time for us to dissolve our marriage. “The things that strike me the most in our conversations it’s been how dedicated both of us are to our families. So, we look at these situations and I think we just feel like it’s best for the happiness of each of us to live apart.”

Turner added, “I still love this person, there’s no doubt in my mind. I root for her every day.”

Turner and Nist have a prenuptial agreement, and they are planning to return their Neil Lane wedding and engagement rings, per contractual stipulations.

This is the second marriage for both Turner and Nist, who had each wed their high school sweethearts. Gerry and his late wife, Toni Turner, were married for 43 years before she died in 2017 from a bacterial infection. Theresa was married for 42 years to her late husband, Billy Nist, who passed away in 2014. Gerry and Theresa each shared two adult children and multiple grandchildren with their deceased spouses.