The Taylor Frankie Paul saga puts a spotlight on reality TV’s love of influencers

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN

(CNN) — Had things transpired differently, Taylor Frankie Paul would be six episodes into her quest to find love on the small screen. Instead, the TikTok influencer-turned-reality personality-and-canceled-Bachelorette-star this week appeared at a contentious court hearing that resulted in Paul and her former partner Dakota Mortensen being granted protective orders against each other.

During the nearly two-hour hearing on Thursday in Salt Lake City, lawyers for Paul and Mortensen described incidents, as they have previously, in which their clients accused each other of being physically abusive during their relationship and as recently as February.

Paul, whose rise from #MomTok earned her a spot on the cast of Hulu’s “The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives,” and Mortensen, who made his first appearance on Paul’s TikTok account less than a year after her divorce, were ordered by Commissioner Russell Minas to stay at least 100 feet away from each other for three years. Minas encouraged them to abide by the order, for themselves and the sake of the two-year-old child they share.

“I’m hoping you’re not people who just thrive on the drama,” he told the pair.

Eric Swinyard, Paul’s lawyer, told CNN in a statement after the hearing that the outcome was a “significant step forward” and that Paul “looks forward to continuing to cooperate with the Court” in the custody case.

CNN has reached out to a representative for Mortensen for comment.

Paul is not the first influencer to have her robust online following open doors for her in the realm of reality TV, but the legal case that’s brought a network’s million-dollar franchise to its knees in an unprecedented way has highlighted a uniquely 2026 debacle: What happens when an influencer-turned-reality star’s life becomes too real for TV?

Trials and tribulations

When announcing Paul as the Season 22 star of “The Bachelorette” in September 2025, ABC touted her as a single mother who “shares the highs and lows of her life with unfiltered candor.”

With “fearless openness,” the network added in its press release, “she inspires others to embrace life’s chaos and own their story.”

Paul aired that chaos openly on “Mormon Wives,” including the 2023 incident at the heart of events that led to her season of “The Bachelorette” being canceled after TMZ published a video showing her in a physical altercation with Mortensen.

These days, she is at times more judicious with her sharing, briefly deactivating her socials as Thursday’s hearing approached.

At the hearing, Paul’s lawyer told the court that Mortensen had been overheard by a witness, who is also a cast member on “Mormon Wives,” discussing the possibility of leaking videos to the media, allegedly naming TMZ in particular at the time. Mortensen’s lawyer denied at the hearing that he was behind the release of the video.

CNN has reached out to TMZ for comment.

In the video, which TMZ said was part of legal proceedings and which CNN did not independently verify or obtain, Paul appears to throw a barstool at Mortensen in the presence of a child.

At the end of Thursday’s hearing, where lawyers for both Paul and Mortensen discussed a range of incidents, Minas said he found that “there’s been violence that’s occurred both ways” before issuing the mutual protective orders.

The release of the 2023 video by TMZ set off an unprecedented series of events, with ABC making the decision to shelve Paul’s fully-shot “Bachelorette” season that was set to premiere that weekend. ABC, which shares the same corporate parent as Hulu, has not addressed whether they were aware of the video and has seemingly stuck by Paul’s side while remaining noncommittal about what to do about the season, which with each passing proceeding is skewing unusable.

“I think everything really is a day at a time,” Rob Mills, Executive Vice President of Unscripted and Alternative Entertainment at Walt Disney Television, told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview earlier this month. “Everything concerning Taylor, first and foremost, is that we’re making sure anything she needs on a human level is taken care of, and then we can talk about anything from the show perspective.”

Mills said in another interview that he anticipated “The Bachelor” — the show that originated the franchise — to return in 2027.

Paul’s representative told People magazine in a statement at the time that she was “very grateful” for ABC’s support and that she was prioritizing her family’s “safety and security.”

Part of that initially involved continued use of her social media platforms to discuss her personal matters, saying she was committed to “showing how ugly healing truly can be.” Less than a week later, her socials went dark.

Influenced

In its early days, reality TV turned socialites like Paris Hilton and figures from tabloid culture like Kim Kardashian into influencers who predated the term. That hasn’t been the case for some time, with casting executives turning social media into their talent pool, where follower counts can be so appealing that it becomes easier to turn a blind eye to what, in hindsight, should have been red flags.

Existing scandal hasn’t deterred streamers from picking up influencers for reality TV shows in the past, although the allegations Paul faces are among the most serious.

TikTok star Charli D’Amelio and her family scored a reality show with Hulu following a brush with internet cancellation. In 2020, D’Amelio and her sister Dixie were criticized for making faces and gagging noises to food served to them by personal chef Aaron May during an episode of a YouTube show. May later told the YouTube channel, the Hollywood Fix that he remained in good standing with the D’Amelios and that the ordeal was ultimately “all fun and games.”

D’Amelio, who at one point was one of the most-followed people on TikTok, lost a reported one million followers on the platform as a result. “The D’Amelio Show” debuted in 2021 and ran for three seasons.

The show ended unceremoniously and not because of scandal, rather so the family members could focus on other business ventures, including a footwear brand, according to Deadline.

Sometimes, scandal can work in favor of a reality star.

That was most recently illustrated by the wild journey of “Vanderpump Rules” star Ariana Madix, the protagonist in what became known as “Scandoval” – when an affair between her former boyfriend of 9 years, Tom Sandoval, and her best friend Raquel Leviss, who were both featured on the show, held the news cycle captive for weeks in 2023.

Madix had appeared on Bravo’s “Vanderpump Rules” since 2013 up until 2024, when the series as fans knew it went off air to recast a new, younger batch of servers working at “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” alum and restauranter Lisa Vanderpump’s West Hollywood mainstay Sur.

After the show ended, Madix – who was already an established reality star and online influencer, went on to land an ongoing hosting gig on “Love Island USA” and starred as Roxie Hart on a Broadway production of “Chicago.”

The influencer to reality TV star pipeline likely won’t change anytime soon.

ABC has cast a host of influencers for its reality competition show “Dancing with the Stars,” including YouTuber Olivia Jade, “MomTok” influencers and “Mormon Wives” stars Jen Affleck and Whitney Leavitt, and shopping haul YouTuber Bethany Mota, among others.

Hulu also recently announced the cast of the all-new “Mormon Wives of Orange County,” a cast that consists of a group of women who are all established influencers on various social media platforms, following a similar casting formula as the original Utah-based series.

One of the cast members includes Affleck, a “MomTok” alum who appeared on the original iteration of “Mormon Wives.” Because the reality is, when a formula works most of the time, why change it?

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