The Paul Levesque regime has taken full control. Earlier this month at WWE WrestleMania 40, WWE Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque kicked off the weekend by welcoming fans to a new time of WWE. Stephanie McMahon, Levesque’s wife and former WWE executive herself, echoed the sentiment on WWE WrestleMania 40 Sunday, declaring that the 40th edition of WWE’s signature spectacle was the one she is “most proud of” due to it being the first WWE WrestleMania “of the Paul Levesque era.” These words alluded to the fact that for the first time in company history, WWE has no corporate ties to Vince McMahon.
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Vince had been slowly fizzled out of power over the past two years. Sexual misconduct allegations in early 2022 led to Vince stepping down and later retiring from his corporate positions, but his shareholding power allowed him to essentially reappoint himself to his former powers just six months after calling it a career. That tenure back on the mountaintop lasted just about one year, as January 2024 saw Vince resign altogether in the wake of a sex trafficking lawsuit filed against him and WWE. With WWE now under Endeavor ownership, Vince is left with no secret passage back into the company and has begun selling off his shares by the millions.
WWE’s post-Vince product has received praise from fans, critics, and talent across the industry, with more people than ever wanting to be apart of it.
Jesse Ventura Discussing WWE Return
That includes The Body.
Speaking onย The Vanguard, WWE Hall of Famer Jesse Ventura revealed that he has been “in talks” with WWE about a return now that the company is in a “new direction.”
“I will tell you this, now that wrestling has chosen this new direction, shall we call it, Jesse Ventura is in talks with them. It required them going in this new direction,” Ventura said. “I hope you get what I’m saying about the new direction. The direction the company is now going was good enough for Jesse Ventura and the WWE to begin talking again.”
While Ventura did not mention Vince McMahon’s exit specifically as why he is now open to returning, the two’s history suggests that McMahon was a reason that had been holding him up. Ventura sued McMahon in 1991 for not receiving the same royalty benefits as other talent on the roster. Ventura won $801,333 in the verdict. Tensions resumed in the years that followed when Ventura pushed for wrestlers to unionize. He would make sporadic WWE appearances in the decades that followed but never took up a full-time return.
