© Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images/ © Jack Gruber / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
Joe Rogan is speaking out about why he couldn’t interview Kamala Harris during the election. Last week, the book Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House claimed Rogan put up several obstacles to deter Harris from setting up an interview, including blindsiding the Vice President by scheduling an interview with Trump on the Friday her team tried get her on the show.
Via NBC News
Flaherty had called his Rogan contacts on October 18, before the rally was set. “We could do Friday, the 25th,” Flaherty said. “Wish we had known about this sooner, because he has the 25th blocked out as a personal day,” one of Rogan’s reps said. “What about Saturday morning?” Flaherty countered. “Only if it’s before 8:30 a.m.,” came the tough reply.
The tone is different, Flaherty thought. The vice president of the United States is offering to come to your f—ing show, and you keep putting up more hoops. Harris’s team still wanted to make it work, but a new wariness set in.
On October 22, the same day the Harris camp announced the rally, the Associated Press reported that Trump would be Rogan’s guest on Friday — the “personal day” Rogan had originally reserved.
In the most recent episode of the JRE podcast, Rogan called B.S. on the book’s claims.
“One of the things they said that wasn’t true was that we lied about the day that Trump was coming on. No, we just didn’t tell you that Trump was coming on. He was already booked a long time ago,” Rogan said Tuesday on his podcast.
Rogan also explained that he couldn’t speak to Harris on Saturday afternoon and needed to be at 8:30 am because he had his buddies in town to watch UFC 308.
“They wanted to do it that Saturday, the day after Trump. I said, ‘I’ll do it, but it has to be at 8:30am’. The reason was that I had a podcast already scheduled, which was a live UFC podcast.
“I flew in three of my buddies from California and we were all going to do this podcast together. We had committed to doing this. Like, they were already in town. I can’t just say, ‘No guys I can’t do this awesome thing because I have to interview Kamala Harris’.
“It seems like I should to some people, but that’s because you’re in the politics business and I’m an MMA commentator – this is part of my job. I said I would do it, but it has to be like 8:30 in the morning because I have to be done by the time the fights start. That’s reasonable, they didn’t do that either.”
Joe Rogan couldn’t do the podcast with Kamala Harris because he refused to miss Max Holloway vs Ilia Topuria 😭
“For UFC fans, that was a HUGE fight… I’m not gonna miss that!”
🎥 @joerogan #UFC #MMApic.twitter.com/YbXyb3Er49
— Championship Rounds (@ChampRDS) February 5, 2025