Fox News’ Will Cain set the record straight about his interview with longtime actor, businessman and occasional pro wrestler Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, saying the star never said he regretted endorsing Joe Biden in the 2020 election. He also reprimanded talk program “The View” over its presentation of Johnson expressing regret for making any endorsement at all, as well as breaking down why Johnson’s non-endorsement doesn’t automatically mean his ballot will go toward Donald Trump in November.
“I didn’t come away with the impression of, ‘Oh, he’s going to vote for Donald Trump,’” Cain said on his Fox News show and podcast “The Will Cain Show.”
“Let’s start with cynicism. Let’s start with what that conversation has been turned into. The headlines screamed on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and even this morning, today, in outlets like Vanity Fair, that Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson ‘regrets endorsing Joe Biden,’” Cain said. “That characterization, that distillation of our one-hour conversation, has been treated with a community note on X.”
“He did not say to me that he regrets endorsing Joe Biden,” Cain said. “He did say he regrets making any political endorsement. It has been turned into, every headline screaming, ‘He regrets endorsing Joe Biden.’”
Cain’s remarks come after numerous observers and media outlets responded to his interview with Johnson, where the two discussed topics including “cancel culture,” his thoughts on division in the country over the past decade, as well as his decision to no longer endorse a presidential candidate going forward. The topic became a talking point for others like the panel on “The View,” which Cain called out as misleading information.
“Outlets like ‘The View’ played that clip to the response of an overwhelming chorus of boos towards The Rock from those sitting in attendance before Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar,” Cain said. “Joy Behar going on to say, ‘Should we care about celebrity endorsements,’ apparently lacking any self-awareness that the entire show, ‘The View,’ is based upon the idea that something matters because it’s said by a celebrity.”
“I also think there’s many who are treating this moment with cynicism, in that they are saying, The Rock is simply doing this because now it’s good for business — he’s now involved in WWE. He now wants a more conservative audience,” Cain continued. “And I can’t tell you another man’s motivations. I can’t tell you why — there were no further conversations behind the scenes, besides those which you see on-camera, that would have shed light on that conversation. I can’t peer into someone else’s soul, but I can tell you that even if that cynicism is warranted, even if Joe Biden wasn’t rejected by The Rock, even if Dwayne Johnson doesn’t regret endorsing Joe Biden, it is notable. It is important.”
Citing Mary Katharine Ham’s thoughts on “The Megyn Kelly Show,” Cain went on to explain that Johnson’s acknowledgment of how Biden’s presidency was part of recent divisiveness showed there’s a “shift” in what’s seen as “normal in the mindset of the ‘normie,’ in what has been normalized,” as Johnson’s decision-making is part of the fact that despite his celebrity status, he is “normal-adjacent.”
“He doesn’t come off as someone who was raised in celebrity culture. He doesn’t come off as somebody attempting to be elite,” Cain said. “He comes off as someone who wants to be in touch with Americans. I think that in 2020, most normies saw, for better or for worse, saw, whether or not they should have, saw Joe Biden as a return to normalcy.”
He added: “In Hollywood, declining to endorse Joe Biden — even if he’s going to behind-the-scenes vote for Joe Biden — is almost the same as an endorsement of Donald Trump. That’s what you saw on ‘The View,’ because they’re still living in this insane world, that Donald Trump represents a threat to democracy… That ‘elite, poisoned culture’ will see the statement that lack of endorsement of Joe Biden is the same as an endorsement of Donald Trump. But it’s not.”
Cain brought in Trump’s former political adviser Kellyanne Conway, who weighed in on Johnson — though she seemingly mischaracterized Johnson’s words and misstated Johnson’s remarks.
“It’s huge,” Conway said. “I think it’s incredibly important, Will because he didn’t just un-endorse Joe Biden and go quietly into the night, he explained why. He said he’s not doing that again for two main reasons. No. 1: he thinks that Joe Biden has divided America. And No. 2: he’s so tired of ‘woke’… It’s incredibly important when somebody stands up, speaks up, puts up and shows up, and he did that politically.”
