Following Chris Jericho’s victory over “Hangman” Adam Page during Saturday night’s All Out pay-per-view to become All Elite Wrestling’s first-ever World Champion, the wrestling veteran received social media congratulations from past and present colleagues, as well as from fans all over the world. It also seems that Jericho’s well-wishers include Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang, who took to Twitter over the weekend to praise both Jericho and AEW following the success of All Out .
On Sunday night, Yang tagged Jericho in a tweet that congratulated the 48-year-old wrestler for his championship victory at All Out , adding that he’s “rooting” for AEW to make the wrestling industry more “talent-friendly.” The presidential candidate didn’t expound further on this message but wrapped his tweet up by tagging AEW co-executive vice president Cody Rhodes and adding a thumbs-up and bicep emoji at the end.
Yang’s recent social media praise for Jericho and AEW came close to four months after he notably referenced AEW in a Twitter post and seemingly compared the fledgling company to his campaign as an underdog in the race for next year’s Democratic presidential nomination. In this tweet, Yang said that he and his supporters – the so-called “Yang Gang” – would “definitely” be AEW if they can be compared to a professional wrestling promotion.
Per Daily DDT , Yang wasn’t the only Democratic politician who brought up AEW or its employees in their public statements. In May, New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted that Cody Rhodes’ stories about being in an interracial marriage with his wife, Brandi, represented a “promising peek into what growth looks like in our national discourse on race.”
US Presidential Candidate Andrew Yang Congratulates Chris Jericho, AEW https://t.co/wK5bDKWnnp pic.twitter.com/3WRTHvkhnQ
— WrestlingINC.com (@WrestlingInc) September 2, 2019
“The significance of this goes beyond an entrepreneur and politician whose platform centers around the noble goal of establishing a universal basic income,” Daily DDT wrote in June. “No, between this and AOC’s recognition of AEW in some positive way, it’s an example of a wrestling promotion receiving positive attention from the political sphere.”
In addition, Daily DDT opined that Yang and Ocasio-Cortez’s positive remarks about professional wrestling personalities and promotions were “significant” because of how politicians tend to frown on the industry.
As of this writing, the comments on Andrew Yang’s congratulatory tweet for Chris Jericho and AEW have largely been positive. Several Twitter users expressed amazement that the Democratic presidential hopeful appears to be a wrestling fan, while others focused mainly on his political platform and why they believe he could be a good president if elected. There were also commenters who combined both wrestling and political references, including one user who tweeted that Yang should put fellow Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden “in the walls of Jericho.”
