Jesse Ventura
speaker
493 appearances
3 recordings
3 series
first heard Dec 2024
last heard 25 Mar
Jesse Ventura’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Mar 2026 with 1.
Appearances
And steal some of your playbook. He took all of it. He's still riding it and they won't admit it. They won't. And he took all of it. Took my playbook. I didn't raise money. I held rallies. You know how much money I raised to become governor?
Yeah, that's all I raised. If I ran for, I'll tell you what, I, I could have beat either one. I could have won the presidency. If I had, if Mark Cuban would have backed me financially, like, uh, who do you call it? Back Trump. I'd have beat both of them if I don't want to do what year 2016 right now. And Trump knows that you want to know why he knows it. He's in the Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame.
He knows damn well I'm the greatest talker there's ever been in wrestling. He knows damn well he couldn't hold a candle to me if I had a debate with him. The best thing he could do would be sit in the chair, keep his mouth shut, and let me talk.
Oh, not a bit. Donald Trump knows deep in his heart, and Jesse Ventura's never lost an election. I would have been the biggest threat he'd ever had out there because I'd have beat him. And you know why else I'd have beat him? I ain't a criminal.
Yeah. Yes, he was, though, in a way, because he didn't talk straight. Well, I'm just saying non-politicians. He took it beyond that. He took it to wrestling, lied about everything.
Well, no, no. And I mean, lied about everything. He just say whatever he wanted to say. I'll be interested now and I'll leave it at this. Let's watch in the next four years how much of that stuff gets implemented.
No, I wasn't necessarily. I don't support Democrats or Republicans. He joined the Republican Party and he even did worse. He joined the ultra conservative evangelical right. Pretty hard for an agnostic atheist to support that.
Multiple reasons. Personal. More to do in life. I could have won easily. I remember when I had the highest approval ratings in Minnesota history at 73%, 72%. And I remember right before re-election was due to happen, I had fallen to 49%. And the media immediately challenged me and said, oh, my God, for the first time, you're under 50%.
I looked at the media and I said, are you guys really that stupid? I said, you must consider something. It's a three-person race. If I'm at 49%, that means I'm up 12. I won with 37. Right. So if I'm now at 49, I'm up 12. It's a landslide. People forget in a three-person race, the dynamics change.
Mainly because they attacked my children. They couldn't attack nothing else. So they had to go after my son. They had to go after my kids.
One of the reasons. The other was money. You know how much I was being governor for? Let's get it on the board. All right. When I was governor, I got paid $120,000 a year. You know how much the football coach at the University of Minnesota makes? $4 to $5 million a year. So I guess coaching football has more responsibility than being governor. I can only assume that by how our society pays.
The governor makes, now he makes 150, but at my time it was 120, and the football coach makes 4 million, 5 million. Okay, out of the 120,000, I had to pay taxes. Yeah. Right? Out of the 120,000, I also had to pay for my car that drove me around. They deduct the mileage to and from the Capitol. They only let you have it during the workday.
So I said to them, okay, I'll drive my private car to the Capitol. Then I'll take the governor's car so I don't get charged money. Oh, public safety come in and said, you can't do that. Why? We need you in the governor's car because it's got the weapons and the safety and the radios. So it's a catch-22. They stick, make you use the car and then charge you for it. It comes out of your paycheck.
It don't end there. You know what else I had to pay for? Every meal that me and my family ate at the governor's residence is deducted out of my pay.
Well, I was being governor of Minnesota in the end. I'd say for 40 grand a year.
Yeah. There you go.
And I'm in charge of a $16 billion budget. Huh. Uh, what do you think I'd be making if I was the CEO in the private sector of a $16 billion company? If I was the CEO, 120 a year.
Yeah, it pays a lot better. I might, I might even win more, but anyway, no, that was a reason I didn't run again. Being honest, the money. Oh, I guess I could have made more money if I wanted to become corrupt. You know, if I'd have wanted to sell my soul to rock and roll and take some payola, I suppose there was money to be made. Jesse was just too naive, and Jesse's just too honest.
I don't do that. That's called public service. I did 14 years of it. Six in the Navy, four as a governor, and four as a mayor.
Probably that I speak first before I think. That I'll react and say something that I'll then they'll I'll have to make amends for it because you're in the political arena. That's what's wonderful now about coming back to wrestling. Yeah. You don't have to worry about that. Right. Handcuffs are off. I can say anything I want about anyone. Sounds like you're excited about this. I am.
Showing 461–480 of 493 · page 24 of 25
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