Jonna Mannion Explains Her Rogue Vote for Michele on 'The Challenge: USA' Season 2

The Challenge: USA season 2 is here! Every week, Parade.com will speak with the CBS reality alumni who were eliminated from the all-star competition.

The last time we saw Jonna Mannion on network TV, she was quite the different person. Nearly ten years ago, she walked out of elimination with her head down, berated by her partner and feeling more vulnerable than ever. What a difference a decade makes, though. Through the All-Stars spin-offs, Jonna cemented herself as a Challenge powerhouse, the only woman to come in first place three seasons in a row. And so when she came back on our screens for The Challenge: USA season 2, her reputation preceded her, and she became the number one pick during the team draft.

Unfortunately, that first day was the apex of Jonna's time in Croatia this season. During the first vote, she took advantage of the individual and anonymous voting structure, going against her team's wishes and voting for Michele Fitzgerald after receiving word not to trust her. She was one of only a few votes in the Hopper to send the Survivor winner in, though she prevailed. She was almost immediately caught out on being the rogue vote, suddenly becoming the biggest red flag on the team that bore the same name. The next round, a group of CBS alumni decided to take advantage of the numbers and gun for the six MTV vets before they ran away with the game. While the green team did their part to get Tori Deal into elimination, the others got a third of the votes stacked on a shocked Jonna. And though the two-time winner touted herself as the one you don't want to see in elimination, this wasn't her day, as she got flung from the game as hard as Tori did during their physical bout.

Now out of the game, Parade.com speaks with Jonna about whether the vets agreed to work together before coming into the game, being a part of "Team Red Flag," and why she chose to vote for Michele.

Related: Everything to Know About The Challenge: USA Season 2

It's been nearly a decade since you were last on broadcast TV on The Challenge. Since then, you've appeared on every All-Stars season, as well as the World Championship earlier this year. What was your reaction when you were asked onto this season? Did you know about this mixed format before going on?
Oh, no, I had no idea. I feel like I kind of like conquered All-Stars. I pretty much went to the highest level that I could go there. And so it was a personal goal for me to up the level of competition. So when the show came about, and everything happened, and they called me for it, I was like, "Great. This is my chance to prove to everybody that it's not just competing against older people on All-Stars.  am now stepping into the competitor that I am. And I'm ready to prove that personally to myself and everyone else, that I'm ready for this, I would love to do the main show again, but just being a mom of two, leaving for that long period of time just doesn't work for me. So when the World Championship came up, and then the opportunity to be on The Challenge: USA, I was stoked.

So you mentioned on the show that you had spoken with Wes prior to coming out for the season. Was there any general scuttlebutt among the veterans in the preseason to look out for each other?
Normally, when you go on a show, you know, people kind of chat before, like, "Oh, who's going, whatever." But I have my regular life here. I tried to explain this to someone the other day. I basically live under a rock. For instance, I went into this not knowing that Amanda and Tori didn't like each other. I was standing on that platform, and everybody was dying laughing when they saw Bananas and Paulie and Josh were all on the same team. But I was like, "What's so funny?" Because, for the past seven years of my life, I haven't been paying attention to what's going on on The Challenge. So this time around, the only ally I knew that I had was Wes.

Talk to me about those personalities that make up "Team Red Flag." What was your reaction to begin picked first in the draft? And how did that change as you saw the chaotic personalities on your team come together?
So I was pretty excited to be first-round draft pick for the second time in a row. Now, I'm starting to think, though, maybe don't pick me first. [Laughs.] The crazy thing about USA was I didn't know any of these people. And then so when you walk into a game, you have no idea if it's going to be teams, if it's going to be pairs, individual. I tend to thrive in like the individual and pairs format. I've always wanted to play a team format. But this time around, I didn't know what to do.

We've see how the vets play a part on the other two teams, with blue following Cory and Tori's orders, and green going against Wes'. What was the dynamic like with you and Bananas on the red team?
First of all, whoever whoever created this format, I'll just blame T.J. They set us up, man! Come on. I walk into this and we're outnumbered six to 18. And what do all 18 of these people have in common? They're from different shows, wherever the only thing that they had in common, that they probably talked about before coming here, was, "First things first, let's get these six vets out and then we can go from there." And I didn't know walking into this that my back was gonna be against the wall and that basically it was gonna be an uphill battle the whole way.

So as far as how the teams broke down, in the past, Bananas and I, when I was on the flagship show before,e he was responsible for me going home. [Laughs.] So he and I have never really been allies. But I was excited this time around to be able to basically be forced to work with them. I would say I probably would have rather been on a team with Wes. But I think I think this time around, we finally got to work together, even though it's short-lived.

Let's get into your vote for Michele. What led to you putting her ball in that tube? And how did it feel knowing you may have contributed to her getting voted in?
Oh, it 100% did. So what's funny is I actually spent this past weekend for the premiere with Michele. We're just sitting there, [and] we're like, "Where did we go wrong? What happened?" I'm blaming that on Wes. [Laughs.] But the funny thing is, what happens when you're on a show, and you tend to leave, if you leave early, I feel like a lot of the story really isn't told.

I just became a huge Survivor fan. I've been watching every single Survivor. The way that my brain works, and always has, is I get in my own head. Immediately once I found out what the game was, I was like, "Whoa." Everybody thinks this is like a red team, blue team, green team thing. I saw all the layers immediately. That's how my brain works. I was just like, "This isn't just teams. I know, at some point, this is probably going to be individual." There were just so many complicated layers. It's so funny. Cory was actually my roommate. And him and I are very different. But this is our first show together. But he would walk in and be like, "They're all coming for us." And I was like, "Don't worry, there's different ways to navigate. If you're the main vote, then we'll all just vote for girls. And you could tell he was like thinking like, "Wait, what do you mean?" There's so many layers, so many steps, so many different factors that play into this game.

So basically, as soon as I figured all this out, my brain's working, working, working. And I was basically playing chess, while everybody was still playing checkers. In my head, I was thinking two steps ahead. I actually had a notebook. I looked at every team and wrote down everybody by team. And then I was like, "Okay, there's nine people from Big Brother. There's seven people from Survivor. There's six people over here that are somewhere in between. They're not really Challenge, but they've done the show."

The reason why I voted Michele in is because, when I broke it down in my analytical brain., this whole game was taking risks. Michele is the only Survivor female winner. I know that her and I are so similar. And I know that there's so much more going on with her as well. So with the people that I was trying to align with, I basically needed Michele out. So I took the risk of putting her in. And had it worked out, had Michele gone home, it would have set me up so much better, you know, it in the future. But here's the problem: You've got to make it to the future in order for it to work. 

I already felt like my back was up against the wall with everything. Either one of two things is gonna happen. I'm either gonna go into elimination every time, or I can take this big risky move by putting her in, hope that she goes home, and better my game. Because at that point, we didn't know that people were going to see the votes. We didn't know that we were going to be able to switch teams yet. We didn't know anything. And so with the information and the knowledge that I had in that moment, I felt like that was my best move was because of the people that she was connected to, and the very few people I was connected to. The only way to better my position in the game was to get Michelle out of there.

And I know it's so funny. Her social game is insane. You see it in episode two where she's sitting there, and she's basically convincing this group of girls, "We need to get the vets out. How do we set up Johnny versus Tori?" She basically had them do what she wanted them to do without them knowing it, and she pushed the whole, "Let's get vets out." I don't think Michele would have been like, "Let's get vets out had she not figured out I was the one who voted for."

Let's talk about you getting found out as the rogue vote. There was a red team meeting that you were conspicuously absent for, where everyone compares notes and realizes it was you. You were clearly shocked that you got five votes this past round. How did that end up happening?
So the funny thing is the first vote with Michele, I was so shocked that I didn't get any votes. How did I pull that off? That should have been my sign there to just lay low, and then let everybody else do whatever. But because I had already put Michele's name in the Hopper, I basically dug my own grave. I should have realized. And now after watching many seasons of Survivor and Big Brother, their games are solely based on the social aspect of it. Survivors especially are very, very good at counting numbers, which is why when she was in that location, she knew immediately that someone from our team voted for her. I'm like, "How did she figure that out?"

But she's a very smart player. We are similar, we're good at similar things, aligned with similar people. So I just knew at that point, my only chance of helping myself is I have to get her out of here. Now that we've come back from all of this, and she and I are a little bit closer now, we've we've talked about it. We're like, "Okay, next time, let's just be on the same page."

I know you've mentioned Survivor a number of times over our chat. You are no stranger to hopping around reality shows, having started on Endurance as a teenager. Would you want to go to a certain island in the future to play?
I wish! I think about it, and Survivor, I feel like I would be really good at that. Because how Survivor works is how I think in The Challenge house. Now if this was 10 years ago, and you gave me the opportunity to be on Survivor, hands down, absolutely. I'd be like, "Yes, this game's for me." Now, today, I don't up I could do all that. I don't function very well when I'm hungry, when I'm tired. So I don't think that I could do it now. But I mean, if the chance was ever given to me, I would consider it.

Next, check out our interview with Ameerah Jones, who was also eliminated in The Challenge: USA season 2 episode 2.