57GJ: In the wrestling world, peo-
ple don’t look to criticize you
about every possible thing, and
to pick you apart, and to drag
your family into it. Of course,
that’s not the case in politics.Treat people like they matter.
That’s the view I took in WWE. My
wife put it in perspective for me
one day over lunch. I’d just gotten
off the road, and I was tired, and
people kept coming up and want-
ing pictures, and I was starting to
get frustrated, like, “Why can’t
these people just leave me alone?”
Crystal, my wife, said, “What you
have to understand is that because
you’re on TV, meeting you is a
pretty exciting thing for a lot of
people.” I realized that it’s not
about me—it’s about them. And Icould put on a smile and be nice
for two minutes and give those
folks a good experience. Politics is
the same way.It’s important in a different
way now, because people pay
taxes to support the government
and they literally are stakehold-
ers, right? The fans are important,
because again, they’re paying the
bills. But if they don’t like you,
they can go someplace else.GJ: The first time I won the world
championship.GJ: So far, it’s just the fact that I’ve
gotten to meet so many great peo-
ple. We have a literacy program.
I go to schools often and read to
the kids.AS: People recognize me now much
more than they used to. I was getting
off the train and a person came up to
me and said, “I just want to shake
your hand. You’re my hero.” Then
another person, who had heard the
first, came up and got in my face and
said, “You’re not my hero.” Some-
times I feel like a human focus group.
Overwhelmingly, the feedback I
get is positive—from friends and col-
leagues and so many people around
the country. I received an email from
one of Gregory Peck’s sons in which
he said, “My dad would be so proud
of the work you’re doing.” Watching
Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch in To
Kill a Mockingbird was what made me
want to be a lawyer. So hearing that
from his son meant an awful lot to me.
But the negative feedback, when I
do get it, is vehemently negative. I was
in a parade in my district last weekend
and there were people yelling out,
“You’re a traitor. You’re ruining our
country. You’re ruining our parade.”
There are a lot of conspiracy theo-
ries about me. I recently saw a photo
of me sitting on a couch next to Jef-
frey Epstein. It was such a good forg-
ery that when I looked at it, I wastaken aback. Then I realized where
we were sitting. It was my cousin’s
couch, on Thanksgiving [in 2018].
They had Photoshopped my father
out and Epstein in. It was done so well
that anyone looking at it would not
have known the difference.
When the president calls you a trai-
tor and says you’ve committed treason,
most people tune that out. But there
are some people who are not well, and
when they hear that, it’s a call to arms.AS: At times, I’ve had to make changes
for security reasons. Apart from that, we
try to lead as ordinary a life as we can.
I remember walking with my daugh-
ter in New York City, and I was getting
stopped a lot. It surprised me, because
I was wearing blue jeans and a green
canvas jacket and sunglasses. I looked
nothing like I do on TV. After getting
stopped several times, my daughter
started to get annoyed, because there’s
only one center of attention in the
family, and it’s her. The last straw was
when somebody asked her to hold
their beer while we took a photograph.
She was like, “Am I now the beer
holder?” I said, “Alexa, I’m just sur-
prised anybody recognizes me.” And
she said, without missing a beat, “Well,
you know, Dad, it’s the pencil neck.”DAVID WILLIAMS/REDUX (SCHIFF). COURTESY CENTER STREET (JACOBS). CHRIS RYAN/CORBIS/GETTY IMAGES (WRESTLING).