Former Minnesota governor and wrestling great Jesse Ventura says he is mulling a run for president as an independent in 2016 — and compared the Democratic and Republican parties to ruthless street gangs.
"I'm giving it consideration ... the pieces seem to fall into place," Ventura, 62, told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.
"I would give the American people the opportunity to elect the first president since George Washington, if you can believe this, that doesn't belong to a political party."
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Ventura said the nation is fed up with both Republicans and Democrats and his presidency would break free of the partisan politics he believes are angering — and crippling — the nation.
"I mean, Congress has a 10 percent approval rating. How can you get any worse than that? I could win on that issue alone," he said.
"The only way to save our country is to break up the two-party dictatorship that exists today … Let's get these two political gangs out of our government …
"They're no different than the Crips and the Bloods. In fact, they're worse because you couldn't [get] the Crips and Bloods to do a government shutdown which affects all of us, could you?"
Ventura said he would likely want Sen. Angus King from Maine as his running mate.
"Angus King would be very high on my list. Brilliant man. Former independent governor of Maine, and now current independent senator from Maine," Ventura said.
Ventura said a break from the two-party system would help return the country to its founding roots.
"It just seems the only presidents we seem to get are Clintons and Bushes and you're telling me that they're the only royal families ... that can be allowed to lead the country?' he said.
"That type of thinking is nonsense. Our forefathers had in mind that we would be a citizen government and that citizens from all walks of life would serve in our government."
Ventura is author of the new book, "They Killed Our President: 63 Reasons to Believe There Was a Conspiracy to Assassinate JFK," written with contributors Dick Russell and David Wayne and out from Skyhorse Publishing.
"I wanted to write this book because I've been studying the Kennedy assassination since about 1985 ... and I wanted to officially go on the record ... for whatever it's worth," Ventura said.
"One hundred years from now, they'll know that the 38th governor of Minnesota did not believe the Warren Commission and did not believe that Lee Harvey Oswald did it."
As to who did kill President John F. Kennedy on Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas, "it's very difficult to say … [there are] multiple entities who very well could have did it.
"The one thing I did say unequivocally, I can tell you who didn't do it: Lee Harvey Oswald … He was a low-level intelligence agent who was set up to take the fall."
Ventura said JFK had numerous enemies including CIA officials he fired, Pentagon brass and the Mafia.
Before his stint as governor from 1999 to 2003, Ventura was one of the world's most popular professional wrestlers and was nicknamed "The Body." He is a member of the WWE Hall of Fame.
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