T.J. Holmes Reveals He Was Accused of Stealing a Cell Phone on a Flight: ‘I Wasn’t Aggressive’

T.J. Holmes opened up about being falsely accused of stealing.

"I was just recently accused of stealing somebody's cell phone on a flight," Holmes, 46, shared on the Tuesday, April 30, episode of his and Amy Robach's "Amy and T.J." podcast. "[It was] JetBlue but I can't remember the flight number or I would tell you. The woman was sitting in 1F and I was in 5C."

Holmes noted that Robach, 51, has previously "witnessed watching a Black man go through" similar situations but "being treated very differently."

"I was using a bathroom at the front next to the cockpit. I come out and there's a flight attendant and a little old lady," he recalled. "She's standing there and the flight attendant asks if I saw a phone in there. I turned around and said no."

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Despite Holmes' denial, the unnamed woman continued to accuse him. "The woman steps toward me and gestures like she is about to frisk me, 'Oh, you don't have it?' In front of the plane she accused me of taking her phone," he added. "I actually crouched down, put my hands on my knees and got down on her level. I ask, 'Ma'am are you telling me I took your phone?' She kind of ignores me."

The passenger found her phone and subsequently realized she was in the wrong. She ended up "screaming across the front rows" to Holmes that she was sorry but the damage was done.

"Sorry doesn't cut it at that point," Robach said, to which Holmes added, "I have to be calm. If there weren't more people around then I wouldn't bend down and be as assertive as I was because I wouldn't have a witness that I wasn't aggressive."

This isn't the first time Holmes has used his platform to discuss the experiences he has had as a Black man. Earlier this year, Holmes and Robach released an episode where they worked through an issue in their relationship live. Robach cried at various points in the conversation while Holmes took a more calm approach.

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Holmes later admitted he had regrets about recording his tense argument with Robach, citing backlash created by racial stigmas.

“I flat out said to both [Amy and our producer] right there on the phone at 4:30 in the morning that I don't want to put this out because this is going to I fear be viewed as a Black man beating up on a white woman," he said on a January episode. “Now, if anybody took their time and listened to that podcast, obviously I was not yelling, screaming. I wasn't doing anything. Now, we are a couple who's having a disagreement, so obviously neither one of us are having our best moments.”

Robach, meanwhile, slammed concerns from listeners that claimed she and Holmes are in an "unhealthy" relationship.

“That would never have crossed my mind. Race, the fact that you’re Black and I’m white, would never have crossed my mind, and that’s kind of to your point,” she explained. “You have to think about things that I don’t have to think about. And honestly, it took me a second to kind of wrap my head around it. Once you explained it — and once we’ve seen the reaction — a lightbulb went off for me, in a way. And it's just a constant learning curve. But, and I've said this the whole time, I don't know what I don't know, and every day I learn more about what I don't know.”

The couple launched their podcast in December 2023, one year after they made headlines for getting cozy outside of the office on numerous occasions. At the time, Robach had been married to Andrew Shue since 2010, and Holmes had been married to Marilee Fiebig since 2010. They both filed for divorce after their relationship was exposed in November 2022.

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After sparking split rumors with their January podcast episode, Robach and Holmes clarified that they were still together.

“We just wanted to check in and let you know that, despite what you’ve been hearing, we are still together. We’re hearing from a lot of you all on our latest episode of the podcast," Holmes said via Instagram video that same month. "It was something we really struggled and debated about whether or not we should even put out there — but at this point I’m glad we did."

Robach added: “Our larger goal in putting out our latest episode was to show that, yes, we like to show pictures of us smiling like everyone else and laughing on social media, but if we want to be real and we want to be transparent, we wanted to show all the sides of us and I would say most relationships. So we hope that all you get something out of it, and we hope you keep coming back."