CM Punk has broken his silence after All Elite Wrestling released footage of his controversial backstage brawl with Jack Perry in August – which saw him sacked.
AEW aired security footage of the real-life fight at ‘All in: London’ which showed him confronting Jack Perry, shoving him, putting him in a chokehold and throwing a punch.
All that took place just steps away from the Wembley crowd and by September, Punk had been dismissed. He signed for WWE in November.
The footage of the altercation aired on AEW’s flagship weekly television show, ‘Dynamite’, a little over a week after Punk trashed the company during a two-hour interview with journalist Ariel Helwani. Several things he said are contradicted by the video.
Now, Punk has broken his silence by posting an Instagram story seemingly referring to the development.
CM Punk rlly bitched Jack Perry backstage and then went on to have a classic with Samoa Joe…
That’s my GOAT 🤣 #AEWDynamite pic.twitter.com/x9x8U2P3xO
— Prabh (@PrabhhSingh) April 11, 2024
CM Punk (right) has broken his silence after AEW aired the footage of his fight with Jack Perry that saw him sacked last year
He shared a photo of George W. Bush’s infamous ‘Mission Accomplished’ speech from 2001, where he declared victory in Iraq
He shared a photo of George W. Bush at his infamous ‘Mission Accomplished’ speech in 2013, when the American president declared that the USA and their allies had prevailed in Iraq after Saddam Hussain was overthrown.
In reality, the Iraqi insurgency gained momentum and eventually developed into a civil war, with American troops only fully withdrawn in 2011.
Punk’s peculiar post comes after he gave his version of events in his interview with Helwani on ‘MMA Hour’.
He told Helwani that Perry stepped him and started the fight, with neither occurring in the footage.
Punk also references he had ‘people with him’, but the footage shows him approaching Perry alone.
‘Jack came back from his match. I’m the next match, I’m sitting there. I got people with me,’ he began.
‘I walk up to him and I’m like, “Jack, why do you insist on doing this dumb internet s*** on TV?” He’s like, “if you have a problem, do something about it.”
Punk initiated the fight by choking Perry before throwing the only punch during the incident
He signed with WWE in November and has since given his own version of events (which contradicts the footage)
‘I was like, ‘Come on man. I can f***ing kill you. What are we doing?
‘I thought I was doing the responsible thing. I didn’t punch anybody. I just choked somebody a little bit. Samoa Joe was there, told me to stop. I quit.
‘I thought I was doing the responsible thing. I didn’t punch anybody. I just choked somebody a little bit. Samoa Joe was there, told me to stop. I quit.
‘I turned to Tony and said, “This place is a f**king joke. You’re a clown. I quit.”
‘I went to my room, Joe and Jerry Lynn came and got me and we’re like, “Let’s go out there and kill it.” I was too fired up. I’m fired up now. I’m probably going to regret talking about all this s***, but that’s what happened.’
In the wake of the night, company CEO Tony Khan apparently ‘feared for his life’ and was allegely shoved against television monitors later in the evening. The footage dos not show this turn of events.
Punk is seen violently reaching for someone off camera before walking out of view to end the footage. Perry does not throw a punch during the incident.
‘All In: London’ is viewed as the company’s biggest show on all time with over 80,000 people in attendance at Wembley Stadium.
Punk claimed that he didn’t punch anybody but the footage released by AEW shows that he does
Perry defeated HOOK on the pre-show, while Punk defeated Samoa Joe in his final AEW match.
Both Punk and Perry were originally suspended for the incident, and neither have wrestled for the company after that day.
Punk was fired ‘with cause’ within a few weeks. He returned to WWE at ‘Survivor Series’ last November.
