John Stamos is standing firmly by his longtime Full House co-star and close friend Lori Loughlin, opening up about her ordeal in the 2019 college admissions scandal — and squarely placing the blame on her estranged husband, Mossimo Giannulli.

Appearing on the Good Guys podcast with Josh Peck and Ben Soffer on October 20, Stamos reflected on his 40-year friendship with Loughlin, describing her as “a saint” who became unfairly entangled in a scandal she didn’t understand.

“I’m not going to debate whether she had much to do with it or not — I know she didn’t,” Stamos said. “He dragged her through the mud. Maybe she saw something, I don’t know. But I know for a fact it was all him.”

The actor recalled learning about the FBI investigation the same morning Loughlin did. She was in Canada filming for Hallmark when news broke that she and Giannulli were accused of paying $500,000 to secure their daughters’ spots at USC by posing them as rowing recruits — despite neither ever participating in the sport.

“I called her and asked if she was okay,” Stamos said. “She told me, ‘Yeah, I saw a couple emails about it. Mossimo handles all that stuff.’ Then I told her to turn on the TV — every channel was covering it. That’s when it all hit.”

Both Loughlin and Giannulli served prison time in 2020 after pleading guilty to fraud charges. Still, Stamos believes Loughlin should never have been punished as harshly as she was.

“She goes to prison for three months, right? And he goes for whatever,” Stamos continued. “In typical Lori fashion, I asked how it was and she said, ‘You know, I met a lot of nice ladies in there. We have a book club.’ That’s her. She didn’t deserve to be dragged through that.”

Stamos didn’t hold back when discussing Giannulli directly, calling him a “terrible narcissist” and suggesting he had been unfaithful during their 27-year marriage.

“Whatever he did to her, it busted her up to the core,” Stamos said. “She put up with a lot over the years. She always made things better, cleaned everything up. But I’ll never talk to him again.”

The Fuller House star went on to express sadness over Loughlin’s recent separation from Giannulli, which was confirmed earlier this month after nearly three decades of marriage. Despite the heartbreak, he described her as resilient, compassionate, and undeserving of the public backlash she faced.

“It’s heartbreaking,” he said. “She’s a good person, a good mother, a good wife. Everything that went wrong in her life connects back to this guy. And now, after all she’s endured, she’s left to pick up the pieces.”

Loughlin’s representative recently told People that while the couple are “taking a break,” there are currently no legal divorce proceedings.

As for Stamos, his loyalty to Loughlin remains unwavering:

“When you’ve known someone for 40 years, you can see through them. Lori’s the real deal — and she never deserved what happened.”