By Emily St. Martin, Los Angeles Times
LOS ANGELES — Country western star Wynonna Judd is confirming that she and her sister, Emmy Award-nominated actor Ashley Judd, do not have a relationship.
She spoke with People ahead of the release of her 10th solo studio album, “The Hard Truth,” which drops Friday, and revealed that the rift between the sisters is still there after years of on and off disharmony.
Wynonna told the outlet that Ashley hadn’t heard the album, as the sisters are not “connected.”
“We’re taking a break, which all families can relate to,” she said. “She’s doing her thing, and I’m doing mine.”
In April 2022, Wynonna and Ashley’s mother, Naomi Judd, died by suicide at 76 after a lifelong battle with depression. Naomi and Wynonna made up the Grammy-winning duo the Judds.
At the time, the sisters released a statement together, writing, “Today we sisters experienced a tragedy. We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness. … We are shattered. We are navigating profound grief and know that as we loved her, she was loved by her public. We are in unknown territory.”
The following month, the two appeared at the annual Medallion Ceremony, where the Judds were inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, and the sisters spoke on behalf of their mother.
“While this is so much about the Judds as a duo, I want to take a moment to recognize my sister, a GOAT,” Ashley said at the ceremony. “Do you know what that means? I don’t think she knows I’m calling her the greatest of all time. She lives on a farm. She’s being a little literal.”
Ashley told the crowd that growing up as the younger sister of Wynonna, she got to “bask in this voice that was around the house, and I’ve always been so proud of the music and so proud of you. … So I know that we’re talking a lot about Mom tonight, as we should be. Our beautiful mother, and I want you to know that you also are being inducted to the Hall of Fame tonight. And newspapers don’t get much right these days, but when the Los Angeles Times said you were Elvis-like, they got it right. And I love you, and I’m proud of you. And Mom is proud of you, and she always was.”
By October 2022, rumors were flying that the sisters were fighting over their mother’s will, a claim that Wynonna shot down while speaking with People.
“Someone told me while I was at Ashley’s house, ‘Hey, did you know that they’re saying this about you?’ I went, ‘Huh? I’m fighting with Ashley?’” Wynonna said. “Fighting over what? I have such a great life. Ashley has a great life. Why would we be fighting over the will?”
This wasn’t the first time a feud was reported between the two. Back in January 2015, Wynonna gave a teary-eyed account of the disconnect during an appearance on AXS TV’s “The Big Interview With Dan Rather.”
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“The only thing I have in common with my sister is a father missing and a mother that’s both of ours. She and I are very different. We don’t communicate, nor do we spend time together, and that’s a long history of being apart,” Wynonna told Rather.
Wynonna said that she and Ashley were dysfunctional, didn’t agree on anything and developed separate lives, but she cared for her younger sister growing up.
“I raised Ashley, so I think there’s a lot of work we still have to do about where do we find the ‘sister’ in all of this,” she said. “She called me sister mommy, and I really had a hard time with that, because I was like, I don’t want to be your mommy. I want to be your sister.”
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