Jesse Ventura Says Vince McMahon Wanted to Fire Him For Pushing For a Union

– Jesse Ventura spoke with WrestlingInc promoting the release of the updated version of his book American Conspiracies. Check out the highlights:

On deciding what will go in the updated book: “We look at what’s developed, what’s happened, what’s got the most meat on the bone, what can we investigate, what’s high profile, and rip it down to what are they lying to us about? If they put it under the cloak of national security, you need to find out if it’s really national security, or is it something they don’t want the public to know about?”

On if he’s been pitched a lot of conspiracy theories he’s not interested in: “I don’t pitch anything. No one pitches me anything. I had the show, where we did a total of 24. But me personally, nobody pitches me anything. It’s usually a deal where it’s government stuff where I have an interest as to why it was done that way or I want answers as to what they told me. I try to stay away from aliens and that type of thing. I’ll let the other people look into that. Our government has enough stuff, and humans do enough stuff on earth without looking for extraterrestrial or things like that. We went there on the show because it’s entertainment, but I personally have no interest in it.”

On how to change the way money is corrrupting the political system: “The answer is as simple as the nose on your face, but it will be as difficult as climbing Mount Everest. The only way to get our country back in my opinion is stop electing Democrats and Republicans. I wrote a book called DemoCrips and Rebloodicans. Our forefathers warned us that political parties would be the destruction of America if they got a hold, and they more than got a hold. I’ll quote Ralph Nader, ‘we live in a two-party dictatorship.’ When I taught at Harvard, I did a class called ‘How pro wrestling prepares you for politics.’ It really does. These two political parties are no different than pro wrestling. In front of the cameras and in front of the public, they’re adversaries, but behind the scenes they’re working together to push the product.”

On if Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders missed a chance by not running as third-party candidates: “If you run as a third-party candidate, you’ll get no publicity. The same corporations that own the two political parties, they also own mainstream media. The last democratic debate, CNN and all of the talking heads declared Hillary Clinton far and away the winner. Don’t need Joe Biden, Hillary is carrying the mantle, that’s what they told us. On the internet, it was the opposite. 81 percent said Bernie Sanders won the debate. Here’s how you look for the conspiracy, you start checking Hillary Clinton’s campaign donations. They let corporations play in the game. CNN is owned by Time Warner. Time Warner is the seventh largest contributor to Hillary’s campaign. Seems like they had an agenda to declare her the winner? Aren’t they all being paid by the same entity, including Hillary? You think you’re getting fair, accurate reporting? No. Follow the money. Loyalty many times, goes to who pays the bills.”

On where people should go for news: “I do watch mainstream media, but I watch it with great skepticism, knowing the agenda that is always pushed. The internet is a phenomenal place, but you have to make up your own mind and do your own checking. Just because something is printed on the internet or put on TV, doesn’t mean it’s true. My case against Chris Kyle, American Sniper. People think I’m taking money from the widow and the child. Complete lie. It’s been me against an insurance company since day one. Kyle’s family hasn’t paid a cent, and won’t pay a cent. But the perception is carried out there that I’m the villain, when in reality I’m the babyface taking on the big insurance conglomerate. See how it can play? Being the villain in wrestling has really helped me get through that. I know what it’s like to be hated and have people dislike you, and that’s what made it easy for me to deal with being falsely accuse and hated.”

On whether he lines up more with Trump or Sanders: “That’s difficult to say. Donald Trump has been a friend for 25 years now, and he actually came to one of my fundraisers when I ran for the reform party in Minnesota. Donald and Bernie went into these things knowing it would be easier to jump in and be a Republican or Democrat. I have similarities to both of them. Bernie, they poo-poo him, but everywhere they go, he gets 20,000. That’s what happened with me in Minnesota. I got news for you, if people show up to see you in person, you can bank they’re voting for you. Both Trump and Bernie are drawing large crowds. Trump is getting plenty of publicity, Bernie not so much. I differ from them, too. I’m completely opposite from Donald on immigration. Bernie, I like things he’s saying because there are major things wrong with America when you have this type of income disparity, where the upper one percent of Americans have 90 percent of the wealth, or half the wealth. It’s absurd that type of wealth is being held while so many people have help. Take the Walton family that owns Wal-Mart. They make billions of dollars apiece a year, yet their employees have to be government subsidized because they aren’t paid enough. That’s where the government needs to step in and say ‘wait a minute.’ You can’t be making billions and expecting the taxpayers to subsidize your employees. People talk about minimum wage, I’ll go the other way and say why don’t we have a maximum wage? Somebody can’t live off of $100 million a year? What could you possibly need? In ten years, you’d be worth a billion. Some say that’s un-American, but they’re making it on the backs of who?”

On if he enjoyed wrestling or commentary more: “Both is a political answer, I focused on both equally. The height of my wrestling career, I never considered being behind the mic. I was focused on being the best wrestler I could be. I only got put behind the mic because I was injured and had clots in my lungs the night before I was supposed to wrestle Hogan in LA. I was on the shelf for six months, and Vince McMahon approached me with an idea. The idea was to put the first villain on the microphone. Vince was right, it got over huge. It got to the point where I was doing both. Vince asked why get thrown around more if I was making the same to talk about it, so I made the transition to strictly being behind the mic, and I don’t regret it a bit because I have my health to thank for it today.”

On having respect for babyfaces on commentary even though he was a heel: “Well I had respect for everybody. The only real controversial thing where Vince ever stopped me was KoKo B Ware. I heard it through Koko. I wanted to have fun. KoKo had the bird, and I said it was the beast and Buckwheat, and KoKo was Buckwheat’s grandson. The NAACP came down on Vince and Vince backed down. I was angry at him for that, because it’s discrimination. SNL had Eddie Murphy playing Buckwheat all the time. I went to KoKo and told him what I was going to do and his reaction was ‘Body, you do whatever you want, because when you talk about me, I make more money,’ so I had his blessing. Vince backed down and he wouldn’t let me do it anymore for fear of the NAACP. He wouldn’t fight them. That’s the only time I saw Vince back down.

On Vince McMahon’s reaction to his attempt to get wrestlers to unionize before WrestleMania 2: “Well, he threatened to fire me. It didn’t matter anyway because I quit. Vince wasn’t going to let me do Predator. I said ‘Vince, I have a chance to co-star with Arnold, and you’re going to tell me I can’t? I quit.’ I went off and did Predator. That’s why they had to open up with Bobby Heenan on Saturday Night’s Main Event. NBC came down on Vince and said they thought they were going to do a show with me, and Vince had to come back to me, and I got my deal. I had the cards in my favor and had signed for Running Man that fall. It gave me what I needed to fight Vince. When I was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2004, I said that my biggest accomplishment in wrestling was that I was the first wrestler to make Vince deal with an agent. That didn’t get over too well. I had the best job in the world. Who else has a job where you can insult your boss on national TV and it’s ok? I only worked one day every three weeks.”

On if wrestlers should unionize: “Absolutely! How backwards could it be? Even when I fought with Vince, it wasn’t over him. I had to pay for my own health insurance for me and my family. It was costing me $5000 a year. If we had a union, maybe that could be diminished to $2000 a year. There’s strength in numbers. You could have retirement. I took the gamble and sued Vince and beat him in 1990. He still sends me quarterly checks. Anything I appear on, he has to pay me for.”

On what kind of extra pay were wrestlers getting in royalties before he sued: “You got stuff, but what Vince wanted to give you. Nothing was negotiated, no percent was set. Vince determined it all. It’s so ridiculous that they still call wrestlers independent contractors so Vince doesn’t have to pay social security either. How are you an independent contractor when Vince tells you when and who you’re working with, and if you win or lose? Plus you can’t work for anybody else.”

On finding out that Hogan outed him as the unionizing ringleader to Vince: “I found out about it at a sworn deposition at my court case. Vince put his hand on a Bible and swore to tell the truth. At a deposition you can ask about anything. I told my attorney how I stood up in the locker room and tried to unionize and the next day I got a call from Vince reading me the riot act. How would he know? There was nobody in the room but the wrestlers, I picked my time. I told my lawyers if they could find out how he learned, I’d sure like to know. I was sitting right in the room and couldn’t say anything. My attorney said ‘Mr. McMahon, has anyone ever tried to start a union?’ and I remember the quote, he said ‘Jesse Ventura may have spouted his mouth off about it one time,’ so they asked ‘How did you know?’ and without hesitation, he said ‘Hulk Hogan told me.’ Right there under sworn deposition, I learned how Vince learned. Hulk continued to deny it, even when Vince went on national TV and was confronted by Larry King. Yet, Hogan continues to deny it.”

On if he’s ever talked to Hogan about it: Nope! Why would I? I was so stunned that day. I showed no emotion. I sat in the chair frozen. In my day, it was the wrestlers vs. the promoters. You were considered an office stooge if you went squealing stuff from the promoter, and he came up when I did. As far as I’m concerned, he’s an office stooge.”