CM Punk on social issues: “Where we are as a country now, I feel like we’re going backwards”

I think my perspective on it now is—I understand if you’re watching a wrestling show and you just want to see people clobbering each other, you want that Shakespearean drama, and maybe you don’t want to get hit over the head with real-world things like who’s a Republican, who’s a Democrat, and all these political topics.

But to me, especially now in 2026, the world is such an ugly place. I understand there being an escape, but also—when am I supposed to talk about this stuff?

Because I do feel very strongly about things, and I tend to lean more toward: I’m not being political—this is human rights, you know, right and wrong.

I’ll always tell people this: the first tattoo I ever saw in my life was on my grandpa’s arm, and it was a number. I was a little kid—I didn’t know what it meant. He didn’t talk about it. He had another tattoo of his wife on his forearm.

But you grow up, you learn things from history books, and then you learn that a lot of what’s in history books isn’t necessarily exactly how things went down. But certainly, you either learn—or you don’t—that there’s a right and there’s a wrong.

And where we are as a country now, I feel like we’re going backwards. We are. We’re talking about taking rights away from marginalized groups.

And I feel that we, as a people, have never been represented by our government in the proper way. I think Obama was president for eight years, and the pendulum swung so far in the other direction that now we’re dealing with the repercussions of that.

But all I can say is—I talk about things that I believe strongly in. And on my Instagram and stuff like that—that’s my platform. I can do that.”