Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson reveals how he heard bin Laden was killed
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson had some serious political and military insider connections, as the movie hunk learned about Osama bin Laden’s death long before then-President Barack Obama announced it to the nation: RadarOnline.com can reveal.
Johnson, 53, received the information about the 9/11 mastermind’s May 2011 death at a home in Pakistan by an elite Navy SEAL team from a “friend of a friend.” He then sensationally posted the news on Twitter before Obama’s televised speech.
“The call was like, ‘Hey, this happened,’” Johnson revealed The Hollywood Reporter‘s Awards Chatter podcast. “And I said, ‘Okay, great news.'”
“On the call, I was told that at that moment the president was going to give his speech in 20 minutes or whatever. I said, ‘Okay, great,'” the president said. Moana powerhouse continued.
What Johnson didn’t do was turn on the TV to watch Obama’s live speech, and instead jumped on Twitter to share his insider information, which was a huge breach of trust.
“So 20 minutes go by and around the 25th minute I tweet this. Then I get a second call and the call is, ‘Yes, the president hasn’t taken office yet.’ And I said, ‘Oh s—‘,” Johnson admitted about his major blunder.
The Hobbs & Shaw infamous star wrote“I just got word that will shock the world – Land of the Free…home of the brave. PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN!” on Twitter at 10:24 PM ET on May 1, 2011.
Obama did not go on television until more than an hour later at 11:35 PM ET to tell the nation that Osama had finally been neutralized after a nearly decade-long manhunt.
Fortunately for Johnson, Twitter, now X, was not nearly as big a source of important news and information at the time as it is today.
One user from 2017 commented in the comments, “Man it’s crazy that this has <1,000 retweets. 2011 Twitter was weird," while a second added, "Super weird to me that this doesn't have like 100,000 retweets."
Johnson has never revealed where he got the insider information about the vicious mass murderer and the death of Al-Qaeda’s founder, although he does have a cousin who was a Navy SEAL.
Johnson was coy about his inside information in a 2012 interview, but bragged that the people who shared the information were “proud” to tell the former WWE sensation.
“If I tell you that, I don’t have to kill you, but I do have to behead you,” he joked, adding, “I have my sources.”
“I have friends high and low. It was a very interesting day… The people who were there proudly let me know,” Johnson boasted.
At that time, The crushing machine star was much more defiant about how comfortable he felt with his tweet because it didn’t directly reveal what he was secretly aware of.
“I knew the president was going to give his speech; I thought he was going to give it at a certain time and so I thought, I think it’s appropriate that I tweet ‘I’m damn proud to be an American’ and keep it in that space without giving away too much information,” Johnson said.
