When WWE SmackDown arrives on FOX this October, both WWE and the television network will do whatever they can to make sure the first broadcast is a must-see.
A recent report has suggested that one item being discussed is having a guest appearance by none other than the President of the United States, Donald Trump.
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Trump and the McMahon family have a history that goes back decades. The Trump Plaza hosted WrestleMania IV (1988) and WrestleMania V (1989), the only venue to host WWE’s signature event in back to back years.
Later, Trump again associated with WWE for a WrestleMania, this time at WrestleMania 23 (2007) when he shaved Vince McMahon’s head as part of the “Battle of the Billionaires,” and he of course appeared on RAW in the build to that event.
Two years later, Trump showed up on RAW in the summer of 2009 when he announced that he had “purchased” the show. And then there is also the fact that Trump is a WWE Hall of Fame member, having been inducted in 2013.
Of course, the WWE and Trump have become intertwined politically as well with Trump’s shift into politics. Linda McMahon served in the Trump presidential cabinet until April of this year, and the WWE was the biggest donor to the Trump Foundation charity in 2017. In fact, WWE contributed more to the foundation than the group’s namesake, with WWE contributions reaching 114-times what the president himself donated.
“Stone Cold” Steve Austin has stunned 46 percent of the people in this photo, including the president. pic.twitter.com/GKkz0cjB5d
— Dan McQuade (@dhm) February 15, 2017
According to Tom Colohue of Sportskeeda, FOX and WWE are allegedly attempting to coordinate a brief appearance by Trump on the October 4th FOX premiere of SmackDown Live. The report suggests that it is a request by FOX, and both sides are apparently confident that they can make a deal.
Colohue writes:
“Starting with a number of internal e-mails and communications, FOX staff floated the idea of approaching WWE and Donald Trump about making a brief appearance on SmackDown Live…At this time there is no evidence that Trump himself has been approached, though FOX staff seem confident that both WWE and the President will ‘understand the potential benefits to all parties.’ However, at least one member of the WWE creative team has been approached about this concept.”
It’s interesting to note that the idea is alleged to be a request from FOX, as WWE has cooled off on their associations with Trump since his presidential campaign in 2016 and subsequent administration. While under most circumstances, having the President of the United States as a member of the WWE Hall of Fame would be something to speak loud and proud about, Trump’s divisiveness among the American public caused Vince McMahon to allegedly issue an edict in 2016 that nobody within his company should talk to the media about Trump.
One would have to search far and wide to find any mentions of Trump on a WWE broadcast since that time. That’s what makes this new report so interesting. By a large margin, Trump is the most unpopular first-term U.S. president since the advent of approval ratings in the 1940s, so there is a tremendous risk in alienating a large section of the WWE audience with an appearance by Trump. Since taking office on January 20th, 2017, the president has never cracked an aggregate approval rating of 50 percent.
A past study showed that pro wrestling fans trend Democrat by a very large margin, with WWE actually having one of the most solidly “blue” audiences of any major sport (albeit with low voting rates). In fact, the only major American sports leagues that had a more Democratic audience were the WNBA and NBA.
The findings of that study was probably one of the mitigating factors in McMahon’s decision to not make light of WWE’s close relationship with the current president over the past three years. However, if the Sportskeeda report is to be believed (and we can not confirm its accuracy), FOX evidently believes the risk is worth the reward when it comes to having the sitting president appear on SmackDown Live.
While the move could play off from the publicity WWE would receive for the appearance initially, and it would likely move the needle in a positive direction for television ratings that night due to curiosity among viewers, WWE will run the risk of having a large section of their audience tune out and turn to another major wrestling promotion which debuts on TNT the very same week: All Elite Wrestling.
