The husband of disgraced YouTube mommy blogger Ruby Franke has left viewers stunned and outraged after saying he still loves his wife despite her horrific abuse of their children.
Kevin Franke, 46, and his son Chad, 20, sat down with Good Morning America for the first time ahead of their Hulu documentary, ‘Devil in the Family: The Fall of Ruby Franke’, dropping this coming Thursday.
Despite his wife being convicted of abusing their two youngest children, Kevin admitted he still has feelings for his wife.
‘I do. I don’t think I’ll ever stop loving her,’ he revealed when GMA asked if he still loved her.
‘I’m not ashamed to say that after being married over 20 years to that woman, I truly did and still do love her,’ he separately told People in this week’s cover story.
‘But that doesn’t excuse what she did, and it doesn’t excuse how she hurt our children and how she hurt me.
‘There’s some bridges that you just can’t cross and then cross back. She burned the bridges, and so I’m moving on.’
However, he said lamented that Ruby will ‘absolutely not’ be welcome back into his life or his children’s.
Since Ruby has been imprisoned following her up to 30-year sentencing, Kevin and his children have reconnected, and the father-of-six said their home is now ‘filled with laughter’ and they have pets chewing the floorboards.
Kevin Franke, 46, and his son Chad, 20, (pictured together) sat down with Good Morning America (GMA) for the first time ahead of their Hulu documentary
When GMA asked if he still loved his wife, he replied: ‘I do. I don’t think I’ll ever stop loving her’
‘I’m just thinking if Ruby was here, she’d be furious, but she’s not, and I don’t care and I’m happy,’ Kevin said.
Despite allowing their children to participate in the vlogging posts, Kevin told GMA, ‘I want people to know that there is real danger when you place yourself or your family or children out onto public social media.
‘There are real consequences associated with that, and I want people to know that, to be just careful with who they choose to follow, with who they choose to put on a pedestal and to put their faith and to put their trust in.
‘Because if you put your trust in the wrong person, it can have massive consequences in your life.’
The couple’s relationship was rift with tribulations, including when Ruby and co-conspirator Jodi Hidebrandt told him to move out to work on his addiction to selfishness.
Kevin filed for divorce in 2023 after 15 months of being estranged from his wife.
Shortly after Ruby’s arrest, he was kicked out of the couple’s family home in Springville, Utah, when Ruby launched a new life-coaching channel with Hildebrandt.
‘The bottom line is that I was choosing to trust a licensed mental health counselor and my wife, and they gave some terrible counsel,’ he told GMA. ‘I have regrets, and I wish I hadn’t done those things.’
Despite Franke never being charged with a crime, some critics think he should be held accountable and take issue with how he’s seemingly changed his stance about social media.
‘But that doesn’t excuse what she did, and it doesn’t excuse how she hurt our children and how she hurt me,’ he said
Despite Franke never being charged with a crime, some critics think of the ‘wimp’ of a dad deserves to be locked behind bars with his wife
‘What is wrong with the father?’ one X user commented.
‘He’s the definition of a wimp. He should never be allowed to be near any of his kids. This wimp probably would allow horrific treatment to happen again.’
Another wrote: ‘Maybe if the dad was not such a wimp?’
A fourth tweeter claimed that Kevin had to have known ‘what was happening to his children’.
‘He’s a horrible father,’ a fifth lamented.
‘I would fight till my last breath to get custody of those kids if I were a relative,’ another wrote.
Despite the critics, Kevin told People that he will do ‘what’s best for my children, for my family, and for myself.’
‘And that’s not going to include her [Ruby],’ he said.
Kevin is close to finalizing his divorce with his imprisoned wife and has even asked the mother-of-six to stop sending him letters from jail.
‘The last letter that I received from her from prison was maybe in March or April of last year,’ he told People. ‘And then I requested the Department of Corrections to ask her to stop writing me.’
Ruby was arrested in August 2023 after the shocking abuse of her children came to light
‘I didn’t want to hear anymore. I didn’t like what she was saying.’
Things really began to change in the couple’s relationship when Jodi Hildebrandt, who will also spend up to 30 years in prison, came into their lives.
Kevin said Hidebrandt caused a rift in their relationship and he was told to move out to work on his addiction to selfishness, according to GMA.
‘The bottom line is that I was choosing to trust a licensed mental health counselor and my wife, and they gave some terrible counsel,’ he told GMA. ‘I have regrets, and I wish I hadn’t done those things.’
Before Hidebrandt formed an alliance with the mommy vlogger, she served as the director of LifeStar Utah County, a franchisee of a national company based in Utah, specializing in the psychiatric and psychological treatment of pornography and sex addiction.
She would weaponize Mormon teachings against her clients to ultimately drive a wedge between couples. More often than not, she would lean into the idea that all sexual acts are sinful and akin to murder.
Ruby’s empire started to dismantle by 2020 after people had started a petition for have her investigated by Child Protective Services. The channel then vanished from the internet in January 2023 with around 2.3 million subscribers.
In 2022, Ruby made the jump to counselor Hildebrandt’s ‘ConneXions’ podcast, where the two would sit next to one another on a couch and give life coaching lessons, as well as, harsh parenting advice.
Prosecutors later alleged that both women were abusing two of Ruby’s kids behind closed doors at Hildebrandt’s $5million fortress of a residence.
Ruby’s emaciated 12-year-old son Russell escaped from the 10,000-square-foot home in August 2023, leading police to find his nine-year-old sister slumped over in a closet.
Russell crawled out of a window and ran to the home of a neighbor, who observed him to have open wounds and tape around his ankles.
Both Ruby and Hildebrandt were arrested shortly after this, and Kevin filed for divorce after her arrest.
Earlier this month, Kevin spoke out to the Utah legislature to warn of the dangers of online family vlogging, saying his wife’s channel ‘8 Passengers,’ which had over two million subscribers, tore his family apart.
‘Vlogging my family, putting my children into public social media, was wrong, and I regret it every day,’ he said. ‘Children cannot give informed consent to be filmed on social media, period,’ he said.
‘If we, as adults, cannot understand the emotional and psychological impacts of sharing our lives to millions of strangers online, how can we expect our children to understand them?’
Kevin made the remarks to the Utah House Business, Labor and Commerce Committee in support of the HB322 bill, which would provide financial assurances to children being used for online content.
The legislation would require content creators that make over $150,000 a year to put aside 15 percent of their income for their children.
