“At that point, I realized she just blindly trusted him and it was gonna be a huge, huge shock.”

The Traitors star Tara Lipinski says she was ‘heartbroken’ for stunned Maura Higgins

"At that point, I realized she just blindly trusted him and it was gonna be a huge, huge shock."

By Dalton Ross

Dalton Ross is a writer and editor with over 25 years experience covering TV and the entertainment industry. *Survivor* is kind of his thing.

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February 27, 2026 4:07 p.m. ET

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Tara Lipinski on 'The Traitors'. Credit:

Euan Cherry/PEACOCK

Tara Lipinski triple loop-triple looped into fame when she won the Olympic gold medal in 1998. But she just barely missed the medal stand on season 4 of *The Traitors*, when the figure skating legend-turned-commentator ended up in fourth place.

Tara made it all the way the ominously titled Fire of Truth, but was then eliminated when all four players — Tara, Maura Higgins, Rob Rausch, and Eric Nam — all chose to “Banish Again.” Unfortunately for Tara, the three others all chose to banish *her*, leaving her “devastated” but also incredibly proud of making it as far as she did. “Never in a million years I thought I’d make I this far,” she said in her final words.

Was banishing Natalie Anderson Tara’s ultimate undoing? How serious was she about quitting after that vote? What does she make of all that drama between eventual winner Rob and the deceived Maura and Eric at the end? And how would she have reacted if bestie Johnny Weir did to her what Rob did to Maura? We asked the Faithful all that and more

Tara Lipinski on 'The Traitors'.

Euan Cherry/Peacock

**: From a game perspective and in terms of the numbers, did you and Johnny lose the game when you banished Natalie?**

**TARA LIPINSKI: **Well, so you can never really know, right? Because these Roundtables can just swing so violently back and forth. It's a bit like whiplash. So yes, there's a possibility that at the table, if we had gone for Rob, maybe everyone would've swung that way. But for me, I kept saying I was hoping to get Rob the next night. I thought, wrongly at that point, before Johnny and I got onto Eric, we were a little suspicious of Maura. So I was also throwing out a Bonnie-and-Clyde-type combo that day.

And I felt more comfortable with that, because after I told Natalie, we definitely were onto Rob at that point. I was pretty sure it was Rob. And I felt confident in that, but we went to Maura, and we knew we didn't have her. And then Johnny spoke with Eric and found out that Rob, Maura, Mark, and Eric were going hard on an alliance towards Natalie, and that Rob was gonna use his double dagger.

So I went to Mark before the Roundtable and tried to get Mark on board, and I was like, "Will you commit? We just need you to commit for that." So without Mark on board, I went to Natalie before the Roundtable, and I said, "We don't have the votes. It is really risky to do that.” I kinda gave a heads-up. I wanted to let it unfold because we were definitely pushing the Stephen thing.

We were doing these hard pushes, and it wasn't going our way. And we thought if we did one more Roundtable like that, it would've been easy for everyone to say, “Oh, they're very suspicious. “And if we had the numbers, I was gonna go and Johnny was gonna go hard to get Rob. So it's disappointing that we didn't have that, because there was just no way around it.

Tara Lipinski on 'The Traitors'.

Euan Cherry/PEACOCK

**How serious were you after that Natalie banishment when you said you wanted out of the game and asked to be murdered?**

It was really hard to sort of switch off the heart, the mind, and the gameplay. I'm a competitive person. So you put me in a game, and I really want to play the game. But then you make friendships. And obviously, you can see the friendship I have with Johnny and how we prioritize our relationship. And it's hard for me at this stage in my life to sort of turn on a…. You know, I'm not a reality star. I'm not here to do that.

These Roundtables are intense and long. And at first, everything was going well, and I was like, "Oh, maybe it's gonna bounce back and ping pong and we'll see where this ends up and who's gonna go.” But when the heat really came from Natalie, I was surprised. She just threw it out there, which is smart gameplay, right? Like, you're getting the heat, you now need to get a little distraction and be like, "Oh, Tara had this Rob idea all day long."

'The Traitors' winner(s) revealed in super tense finale: 'You absolute a--hole'

Natalie Anderson felt 'bamboozled' by Tara Lipinski's 'Traitors' U-turn

And I get that, and I respect her gameplay. I wanted to save her. When they were definitely going hard for Natalie, we bonded that day, we formed a relationship, and that's where it was really hard for me because then I wanted to jump in, but I was, as you could see, so overwhelmed. It was like: Do I just end Johnny and I's game right now? Like, we are done for if I just go for that, or do I try to save her? But there was no saving her with the votes. And I could tell she was gonna vote for me, so all the votes were all jumbled at that point.

So afterwards, it really did get to me that she went home. She was upset. And yeah, there's a part of me that's like, "Ugh, this game is just awful." It puts you in these positions and it really upset me. I'm thankful Mark was so kind, and so was Johnny. And obviously, they made me feel so much better by the end of the night. But yeah, there was a part of this where it was like: This is not my world. I'm like Olympics and broadcast. What is happening? I don't wanna make anyone upset.

Tara Lipinski and Eric Nam on 'The Traitors'.

Euan Cherry/PEACOCK

**When you were standing at the Fire of Truth, how much hope did you have that Maura would actually break from Rob?**

So the first time [at the final Roundtable where Johnny was eliminated] I was for sure. Again, maybe a little too naive there. I was for sure because we had a long conversation about it, and she was like, "I am all in. I'm all in. We are gonna get Eric. He's gonna be so shocked what is gonna happen." And I went back to Johnny. I was like, "We did it! We just we won!" And so at the Roundtable, I was just blown away the first time. Because I believed it!

The second time, clearly, because that just happened, I was a little more wary, but I had spoken to her again, and it just felt like she was really on the fence. So I thought there was definitely at least a fifty-fifty chance.

Tara Lipinski on 'The Traitors'.

Euan Cherry/PEACOCK

**What would your reaction have been had Johnny done to you at the end what Rob did to Maura?**

He would never. Literally, there's just no world that would ever happen. It's so crazy I can say that, but there's no world that would ever, ever happen.

**What did you make of Maura’s reaction to Rob revealing he was a Traitor?**

I love Maura. I really bonded with Maura in the castle. She is one of my friends, and I feel like we'll have this lifelong friendship of this crazy castle experience. I was heartbroken to see it. And when I saw her vote for me, I knew what was coming, obviously. So I was just… I'm not mad at, you know, she can choose whoever she wants to banish. If it's me or anyone else, good. Like, it's a game. There are no hard feelings.

Again, that's just not how I operate. So I felt bad because I knew. I didn't know how it was gonna unfold *exactly* or how Rob would tell her, but I knew it was coming. So it was heartbreaking because at that point, I realized she just blindly trusted him and it was gonna be a huge, huge shock.

Eric Nam, Johnny Weir, Tara Lipinski, and Maura Higgins on 'The Traitors'.

Euan Cherry/Peacock

**At the start of the game, when you and Johnny were trying to keep some distance from each other, do you think anyone bought that? I mean, we've watched you two on TV together for years, and you guys were trying to act like you were not BFFs.**

I really think we would've been gone right away [otherwise]. You see once we sort of came out with our friendship, what happened, and we did become a target, and then all the talk about, “Well, if Johnny's one or Tara's not.” And then they recruit. It's really hard with a duo. So we felt strongly we wanted to play that game and we didn't know if it was gonna work.

We didn't know if there was gonna be someone in there that knew how close we were, but we got the vibe very early on that no one actually knew about the friendship part of it. They just understood that we were both skaters, and we really played up certain lines. We had certain lines that we overused of, like, "Oh, we skated in different generations. Johnny started skating really late when he was 12. Tara won the Olympics at 15 and was already out of the sport."

So we would cross paths here and there and we worked together sometimes, and Johnny would really talk about living in Delaware and me being in L.A. and far apart and that we only sometimes work together, was pretty much what we would say. So I think they just thought, like, "Oh, they're athletes. They're competitive. They're from the same sport, but it's not this friendship and this alliance." And I think we did a good job.

You could see that with Mark. When he was thinking about it, he's like, "Oh, it's like *Dancing with the Stars*. If there's a partner I have, it wouldn't be like that. " And then when Johnny really thought he was done for in that episode, we were like, "Let's just *Thelma & Louise* and go out together."

Tara Lipinski (center), with Natalie Anderson, Maura Higgins, and Dorinda Medley on 'The Traitors'.

**Who stressed you out the most in that castle?**

I always thought it was Colton and Natalie. Johnny and I were on Colton and Natalie before it went to Stephen a little bit. And we were clearly wrong, but we were pretty steady on that. With Colton being really in the forefront and throwing out his opinions without sort of any sort of reserve felt off to me and I felt like, "Oh, he must feel secure in some other way, so he must be a Traitor."

And Natalie, when we were going after the antidote, at first, I thought, "Oh, is she a Traitor? She's so fired up for this antidote. This must be almost like she's putting on a great show!" And I realize now being part of this world and being the strong game player she is, she was so invested. And I think some of that I took as maybe she could be a Traitor.

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