Jim Ross Further Addresses D-Von Dudley’s Accusations: “I Am Not A Racist, I Have Never Been A Racist”

J.R. responds to Dudley’s follow-up comments.

In a media appearance, D-Von Dudley mentioned that he had a racist encounter with a higher-up during his in-ring days with WWE and later went on to reveal that it was Jim Ross. Ross would respond to the accusation and said he never made any racial remarks to Dudley.

D-Von did a follow-up interview with Maven and recounted the specifics of two incidents involving Ross. In one of the situations, D-Von shared that Bully Ray was present when this happened. They were all at an event, and D-Von added that J.R. appeared to be drunk. He allegedly told D-Von that there was something off-putting about him and said it’s because D-Von is Black.

Ross responded to that on the newest recording of Grilling JR. He said he’s not a racist and never has been. Maven reached out to J.R.’s podcast co-host Conrad Thompson and suggested the idea of Ross and Dudley meeting up to discuss things. Ross is open to meeting with D-Von, but does not want to make a show of it.

“No problem! I’m happy to do it! I’m just not gonna put it on tape and make a TV show out of it. Period.” Conrad Thompson said he brought it up because the chatroom kept talking about it and assumed that J.R. did not want to speak on it. Ross replied, “How many times do I gotta address it to satisfy everybody? I am not a racist. I have never been a racist. Ask some of the African-American athletes that I’ve been around and worked with in my 50-year career. They’ll say the same thing, and like I said before, when you and I first talked about this, I don’t remember the first cross word I had with D-Von (Dudley). The boisterous one was Bubba (Ray Dudley). But not in a bad way. He just had no problem expressing himself and Bubba had a lot of ideas. He was a throwback. A main event guy that wanted to be involved into booking his angle, and I loved that. If more guys would do that — and today, they just wait for someone to tell ‘em what they’re gonna do tonight, and that’s the wrong approach in my opinion. But, I’d have no problem reconnecting with D-Von… I’ve never gotten mad at him. I was bewildered about how this could happen. Because like I said, I don’t remember any negative exchanges with him, and what I was allegedly said would damn sure be negative.” Thompson mentioned that Ross would not be up for trying to monetize the meeting with D-Von, and J.R. said, “I’m not. I’m not interested in that. I am interested in reconnecting with D-Von, because I like D-Von.”

If Dudley responds to Ross’ reply, we’ll update you here on Fightful.

Jim Ross returned to AEW commentary for the first Dynamite of 2026. He reflected on that, and his comments can be read here.

If the quote in this article is used, please credit Grilling J.R. with an H/T to Fightful for the transcription.