Jesse Ventura Says He Talked Ric Flair Out of Running for Governor [AUDIO]

Jesse Ventura was on some podcast or another—if you know the origins of this audio, drop me a line and I’ll update—and he was asked his general thoughts on Ric Flair. After talking about getting inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2004 ahead of Flair, who was still wrestling, Ventura started talking about Flair’s never-off-the-ground political aspirations.

Ventura said that Flair came to him with talk about running for governor of North Carolina, but dissuaded him on the basis of the Nature Boy by saying that politics was “much dirtier” than the wrestling business, and skeletons in the closet would be exposed. Flair supposedly confessed to receiving 143 speeding tickets—surely this must be an exaggeration!—but Ventura said the people would never accept that out of the man presiding over the state’s law and order.

MANY other stories that would seemingly prevent Flair from running for that level of office have been well documented. Doing some further research, Flair did indeed tell Regis and Kathy Lee he planned to pursue the governorship of North Carolina on the basis that “Jesse [proved] that anything can happen.”

It’s a shame we were never treated to that campaign.