In his first interview since resigning from WWE in January 2024, Vince McMahon spoke about the late Terry Bollea a.k.a. Hulk Hogan on TMZ’s special on the recently deceased performer.
McMahon, who will turn eighty this month, was interviewed by TMZ’s Harvey Levin for ‘The Real Hulk Hogan’ special, which aired on Fox.
McMahon spoke about his early years as Hogan’s promoter after the star jumped from the AWA to the WWF in late 1983 and led McMahon’s national expansion in the ensuing years. He described his thought process as giving America what it wanted in Bollea and marketing him that way.
The former chairman at WWE shared his memories of Hogan’s famous matches with Andre the Giant in 1987 and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in 2002.
A significant portion of the one-hour special handled the sex tape that became public in 2012 and was later revealed to contain racist comments made by Hogan, which led to WWE firing Hogan in July 2015.
McMahon described the language used on the sex tape as “unforgivable” but defended Hogan by acknowledging, “that’s not like him”. When Levin asked about the decision to bring Hogan back three years later, McMahon stated that, “He wasn’t a racist. He said some racist things and he should pay for that, and he did. We all make mistakes, that was a big one, but he wasn’t a racist.”
While McMahon has kept a very private profile since resigning from WWE in January 2024 after Janel Grant’s complaint was filed, he had several comments where he second-guessed the decision-making at WWE regarding Hogan.
When discussing Hogan being booed at the Intuit Dome this past January, McMahon said, “It wasn’t set up properly” and “that’s not the way I would have done it, and he deserved so much more”, referring to the way Hogan was sent out in front of the crowd and that the result made McMahon angry.
Goldberg added that he was “appalled” at the reaction to Hogan on the January 6 show in Inglewood, California.
Levin said it struck him watching the ten-bell salute to Hogan on the July 28 episode of Raw, regarding McMahon not being present for the tribute. McMahon replied, “It struck me that way as well,” leaving one with the impression that he wanted to be part of it but was not invited.
The others interviewed included Mark Henry, Bill Goldberg, Jimmy Hart, Sylvester Stallone, and Dave Meltzer. There were several quick comments from WWE talent Charlotte Flair, Jacob Fatu, Alexa Bliss, Roxanne Perez, and Raquel Rodriguez.
Henry came off as conflicted about Hogan, acknowledging how much of a fan he was growing up, but that he could not sit there and defend a man who openly stated he was “racist to a point” in the sex tape. He repeated the story that he approached Hogan and Vince McMahon about taking Hogan on a tour of Black colleges and talking about the incident, but Hogan said he had been advised not to talk about the incident anymore.
Foley said that Hogan’s legacy will be limited to the sex tape for some fans, but if you look at the entire career, he did a lot of good things for people, and Foley chose to remember that aspect above the hurt that he caused with his words. He was also disappointed at some of the negative reactions online after Hogan’s passing, citing the hurt it is causing Bollea’s family.
No one was overtly critical of Hogan in the piece, and to their credit, they spent a lot more time on the racist rant than you would have expected given the guest list.
The major takeaway was McMahon’s comments and coming off as being at odds with WWE in a public setting.
