Julie Chen Moonves Thinks Leah Remini Has ‘a Big Heart’ Despite Attempt to Oust Her from The Talk (Exclusive)

While working with Leah Remini on ConversationJulie Chen Moonves thought they formed a strong bond.

So Chen Moonves, 53, felt cheated when – as she claims in her audio memoir But first, God — Remini, also 53, and several of her other co-hosts “went to the network and said, ‘We can’t work with Julie anymore. She’s too tense. She is not one of us. If she stays, we go.'”

The situation happened near the end of the first season while Chen Moonves was on vacation. “At the time, it felt like a betrayal,” the Daytime Emmy winner tells PEOPLE. “It felt like, ‘Oh my God, they can see that my intentions are good.'”

Julie Chen Moonves credits her ‘strong relationship’ with husband Les for surviving his sex scandal (Exclusive)

Chen Moonves thinks the tension came from her giving her co-hosts notes that usually come from production.

“I started out doing news for four years, so the things they were upset about were things that I thought would not only make this better, but there was a lot of legal stuff,” she says.

For example, a TV personality explains that when Conversation first launched in 2010, its co-hosts wanted to comment on the Casey Anthony trial, in which Anthony was accused of murdering her daughter. The jury eventually found Anthony not guilty.

While the trial was going on, “they wanted to go on the air and say, ‘She did it. I know she did it,’ recalls Chen Moonves. “The show’s lawyer and I said, ‘You can’t say that. You might say, “In my opinion, I think she’s guilty. I don’t believe her.”‘ They said, ‘It’s not your job to inform us.'”

Remini, Holly Robinson Peete and Marissa Jaret Winokur did not return for the second season.

‘The Talk’ season one co-hosts (from left) Leah Remini, Sara Gilbert, Sharon Osbourne, Holly Robinson Peete and Julie Chen Moonves.

Monty Brinton/CBS via Getty

Chen Moonves admits in her memoirs that she threw Remini out completely and did not accept an apology King of Queens she was made a star a year later. However, after Chen Moonves developed a relationship with God, she decided to reconnect with Remini after seeing the actress’ husband Angelo Pagano at a party eight years later.

“She has such a big heart,” Chen Moonves tells PEOPLE of Remini. “She is one of the funniest people I know and is very passionate about her beliefs. She is a good person.”

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Actually, since But first, GodChen Moonves says Remini called her to talk about what happened more than ten years ago behind the scenes Conversation.

“She was like, ‘Sharon [Osbourne] is the one who started it,’ says Chen Moonves. “She said, ‘Sharon is the one who convinced me and Holly to do it, and then she got away with it.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, that’s definitely being tracked.'”

Julie Chen Moonves and husband Les Moonves in LA in 2017.

Greg Doherty/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images

Julie Chen Moonves says it wasn’t her decision to leave ‘The Talk’: ‘I felt stabbed in the back’

Chen Moonves eventually left Conversation in 2018 after 12 women accused her husband, then-CBS chairman and CEO Les Moonves, of sexual assault. (Last November, Moonves had to pay $2.5 million to CBS shareholders who New York Attorney General Letitia James believed were initially kept in the dark about the allegations against him — even though he has never admitted any wrongdoing.)

“I felt lost and angry and confused and just lost,” he said Big Brother the host says. “I didn’t know what to do next. I just felt like I wanted some answers and I didn’t know what to do with myself.”

She turned to God, was baptized in 2022 and now belongs to five churches.

“God is full of surprises,” says Chen Moonves. “God is here to help you, but we must go to him first. Give him all your worries. It is always in the darkest times that it is easiest to see the light.”

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But first, God now it’s out everywhere books are sold.

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