Dwayne Johnson For President In 2020? The Rock Still Isn’t Ruling It Out


Would it really be farfetched to see Dwayne Johnson run for president in 2020? As any wrestling fan knows, “The Rock” is the “most electrifying man in sports entertainment,” a bona fide WWE legend who successfully made the crossover from pro wrestling to showbiz. But since we’ve seen a former actor in Ronald Reagan serve as president in the 1980s, and a billionaire businessman/reality show star in Donald Trump win last week’s presidential election, maybe having a pro wrestler/actor at least run for the presidency wouldn’t be out of the question four years from now.

At a press conference on Sunday for his new film Moana, Dwayne Johnson said that the presidency is something he “wouldn’t rule out.” According to Vanity Fair, Johnson said that doing so would be a “great opportunity to help people,” and that the 2016 presidential election proved that “anything can happen,” thus making a bid for the presidency in 2020 something that currently seems plausible.

The Vanity Fair piece went on to state that The Rock has considered the presidency multiple times over the past few months. In March, he tweeted a link to a report from the Independent Journal Review justifying the reasons why people should vote Dwayne Johnson for president should he run for office. The reasons included his “cross-party appeal” among Democrats and Republicans, his status as a crossover star and family man, and his massive popularity among wrestling fans – the “millions and millions” of fans he’d reference in his wrestling promos.

The Rock had also spoken to British GQ in June and admitted to finding the idea of running for office “alluring,” may it be for governor or for president.

“I’ll be honest, I haven’t ruled politics out. I’m not being coy when I say that, but at the moment I am not sure. I can’t deny that the thought of being governor, the thought of being president, is alluring. And beyond that, it would be an opportunity to make a real impact on people’s lives on a global scale. But there are a lot of other things I want to do first.”

Those other things include appearing in more movies, including Moana, where he voiced the Polynesian demigod Maui and sung the character’s songs as well. At Sunday’s press conference, Johnson said that it was a “challenge” to try something relatively new and sing in a Disney movie, but as Vanity Fair noted, it won’t be the first time Dwayne would be singing to a large audience.

As The Rock in WWE, Johnson went on occasional “Rock Concerts,” where he’d bring a guitar to the ring and sing funny songs to insult the fans or other WWE personalities, warbling melodies to the tune of songs like Elvis Presley’s “Jailhouse Rock” and Eric Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight.” And it was those “Rock Concerts” that helped Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda write songs that Johnson could realistically sing on film.

“I got a really good sense of his vocal range from that 10-minute super cut (of The Rock singing in WWE),” Miranda told Vanity Fair. “Once I had the title for the song, which only Dwayne can pull off, we were off to the races. He really sings it beautifully.”

While singing may have taken Johnson out of his usual comfort zone, it goes without saying that politics is a completely different story and a far more demanding arena. Being the “People’s Champ” for a whole nation is different from being the “People’s Champ” in the ring, and it will be a tall order indeed for The Rock.

Dwayne Johnson’s presidential aspirations may have possibly been inspired by his fellow Republican Donald Trump’s recent victory in the 2016 elections, as Bleacher Report had also speculated. Trump, after all, had no political experience prior to his decision to run for president, yet he was able to win the election last Tuesday, upsetting highly-favored Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

[Featured Image by Aaron Davidson/Getty Images]

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