Nick Searcy Explains Why Hollywood Doesn’t Understand Trump

Left-wing Hollywood has not harbored the best attitude toward President Donald Trump in 2017.

Instead, many entertainment elites have unleashed their anger toward the chief executive on awards shows, in press interviews and on social media.

Some artists, however, have held the line and refused to join the ranks of blind-rage liberalism. And “Justified” star Nick Searcy is one of those people.

The openly conservative actor guest-hosted Rush Limbaugh’s radio program on Wednesday afternoon and touched on the disconnect between Hollywood and the president.

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Leftists in Hollywood are “missing the point really badly,” according to Searcy, “because they don’t understand professional wrestling.”

While it may seem an odd analogy at first, the actor broke it down well enough for the audience.

Wrestling, Searcy said, began with two types of wrestlers. There was the “heel,” the man who would break the rules and cheat in the ring. Then there were “babyface wrestlers,” who would often take a terrible beating while refusing to cheat. They played by the rules.

They “always get cheated, but never cheat back,” said Searcy.

He added, “In their mind, they were playing fair and they were playing with integrity.” Over time, the actor theorized, Democrats became the “heels” and the GOP lost its spine and became the “babyface GOP.”

“They [the Democrats] changed the rules to suit themselves when they had the votes to do it,” said Searcy, criticizing Republicans for not sticking to their promises and missing their opportunities to fight back again and again.

Related: ‘Justified’ Actor to Hollywood: ‘You’re on Thin Ice’

The arrival of Trump in politics, continued Searcy, was like the arrival of Hulk Hogan in the wrestling world.

“[Hogan] would hit the heel back with [objects],” said Searcy — and the audience loved Hogan because “they’d been waiting for this for years.” They finally had a wrestler to root for who was willing to employ the same tactics used against him.

Hogan kicked off the “attitude era” in wrestling, in which matches were less predictable and the personalities of the stars were bigger than ever.

The arrival of Trump, like Hogan, had people excited, said Searcy, because he was “a throwback to the attitude era” and was willing to fight back and fight back hard.

“He leads with the chair,” said Searcy of Trump. “He starts clocking people before the bell even rings.”

Searcy then ran some old audio clips of 1980s wrestlers playing tough for cameras — and compared the language to how Trump communicates to crowds.

Hollywood doesn’t understand Trump and is so frustrated by him because they just don’t understand professional wrestling, concluded Searcy.

Related: Nick Searcy Is Proud of Voting for Donald Trump

Asked whether he feared any professional blowback from his hosting of Rush Limbaugh’s show, Searcy waved that off.

“I’ve probably already suffered all the consequences I’m gonna suffer,” he said.

His conservatism actually helped him in one professional instance, he added. He was interviewed by Rush Limbaugh during his years on the popular “Justified” TV series — and the writers of the show enjoyed the interview so much they wrote a scene into the program: It featured Searcy’s character listening to the conservative radio host. It was not a scene played for irony, either.

They were suggesting Searcy’s character listened to the program.

They were suggesting Searcy’s character listened to the program — and they did not make fun of that fact, as many other Hollywood productions likely would have done.

Searcy called his guest-hosting gig “the greatest role I’ve ever been assigned.” That’s quite a comment from a man who stars in not one but two Oscar contenders this year: “The Shape of Water” and “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.”

PopZette editor Zachary Leeman can be reached at [email protected].