BJ Penn confirms intentions to run for Governor of Hawaii: “I am not here for the office. I am here for the people and I am here for our freedoms.”

UFC legend BJ Penn has confirmed his intention to run for Governor of Hawaii following some suggestive posts on social media.

Penn, 42, a former two-division UFC champion, hinted at making a run for office earlier this week. Now, in an interview with his manager Chris Taylor, ‘The Prodigy’ confirmed his intentions to run for governor in his native Hawaii.

“Yea, I am definitely planning on it.” BJ Penn said when asked if he will actually run for Governor of Hawaii. “It is 99.9 percent right now.”

Taylor, the acting manager for Penn, asked what persuaded BJ to make the decision.

“The current state of Hawaii. I feel obligated to do something.” Penn said. “They keep closing down our businesses and shutting down the economy. My people are hurting and somebody needs to stand up and do something. I just want to make it clear, I am not here for the office. I am here for the people and I am here for our freedoms. That’s why I am here. The chief is only the chief because of the love of the people.” 

BJ Penn continued:

“There are currently three guys who are licking their chops and chomping at the bit to release the next set of mandates or restrictions. I don’t see any of these guys working to give our people any freedoms. We’ve got three guys who are willing to tow the line with all of these mandates and who are just taking Hawaii’s Aloha as weakness. We cannot allow them to take our Aloha for weakness Hawaii. We showed Aloha when we wore the masks. We showed Aloha when many of us got vaccines. We showed Aloha when we closed down our businesses. Enough is enough already. Don’t let them take our Aloha for weakness.”

Penn went on to compare the current state of Hawaii to many other places in the world.

“There are stadiums around the world that are packed with fans and people playing sports. We can’t do anything for sports over here. All of the sports are shutdown. Nobody can go into Aloha Stadium.”

Part of Penn’s plan for Hawaii is to get rid of the mandatory vaccine passports which he claims are devastating the states economy.

“The vaccine passports, masks mandates, quarantines, lockdowns, all of these things are crippling us. Our freedom of choice is under attack. My policy is vaccinated with Aloha and unvaccinated with Aloha. The same thing applies to the masks.”

In one of his recent Instagram posts, BJ Penn suggested that he would “get the best doctors, medicines, therapies, and health care the world has to offer to fight this pandemic and always keep Hawaii among the safest and healthiest states in the union”. Taylor asked how he planned to get this accomplished.

“We have to get our economy back,” Penn explained. “One thing I plan to do in order to help boost the economy is to legalize recreational marijuana for people over the age of 21. As we have seen with other states who have legalized cannabis, this will result in a lot of income that we can in turn use to assist with fighting this pandemic.”

Penn continued:

“We need to get back to how things were before the lockdown and that means re-opening businesses and eliminating a lot of these restrictions.”

Taylor then asked BJ Penn about his past and how prior incidents could have residents potentially questioning his leadership abilities.

“You know what, those were very unfortunate incidents and I apologize to the public and apologize to anybody who was around for that. I just want to make it clear that I was never charged with anything. You know, you live and you learn and try to be a better man the next day. That’s all you can really do and that is why I am here. I am here to fight for my people. I would never run from them and I would never sell them out.”

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