Paul Finebaum's Senate Run: Is This a Joke and What Twitter Thinks

So, Paul Finebaum might run for the Senate.

Let’s just sit with that for a second. The guy whose entire professional life is a three-ring circus of grown men screaming about college football—the human lightning rod for every unhinged `alabama football` conspiracy theory—is "seriously considering" a seat in the United States Senate.

Of course he is. In an era where politics is just a vicious, poorly-produced reality show, why wouldn't you cast the king of sports talk radio? It’s the logical next step in our collective descent into absolute madness.

A "Noble Calling" or Just a Smarter Campaign Slogan?

The "Noble" Calling

The official story is, offcourse, dripping with manufactured sincerity. Finebaum told reporters he "felt very empty doing what I was doing that day" after the tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk. It was a moment of profound reflection that made him question his life's work.

Give me a break.

I’m not questioning his genuine shock or sadness over the event. But the leap from "I feel empty" to "I must become a United States Senator" is a canyon of ego that most people don't cross. It’s a script. It’s the origin story they workshop before the announcement. Then there’s the other piece of the puzzle: an unnamed "political operative" who apparently approached him and made a "compelling and compasionate" case for him to run.

Let me translate that for you. "Compelling and compassionate" is political-consultant-speak for "Our polling shows your name recognition is through the roof and you could probably win, so here’s a fat binder of talking points." This wasn't a calling from on high. It was a business proposition. It was a calculation. A 70-year-old man who has to quit his cushy `espn paul finebaum` gig is not doing this on a whim. This is a move.

And it’s a move we’ve seen before. The seat he’s eyeing is being vacated by Tommy Tuberville, who wants to be governor. The former Auburn coach who became a senator. Now the radio host who took calls from fans screaming about the former Auburn coach wants to become a senator. It’s a snake eating its own tail. It’s the same playbook. Find a guy everyone in the state knows from Saturday afternoons, slap a party label on him, and ride the wave of pure, uncut voter apathy and brand loyalty to Washington. This is a bad idea. No, 'bad' doesn't cover it—this is a five-alarm dumpster fire of an idea that signals we've completely given up on the notion that governing requires any actual skill or experience.

Marinated in Madness: The Perfect Political Résumé?

The World's Angriest Focus Group

I’ve listened to `the paul finebaum show`. You almost have to if you want to understand the deep, dark soul of a certain slice of America. It’s been called a "combination of rage room and confessional booth," and that’s putting it mildly. It's a daily parade of human grievance, where the fate of a football program is treated with the life-or-death gravity of a military conflict.

This is the show where, in 2011, a deranged fan named Harvey Updyke called in to confess—brag, really—about poisoning the historic oak trees at Auburn University. That’s Finebaum’s world. He’s not a host; he’s a zookeeper for the most feral sports fans on the planet. He doesn't create policy, he moderates arguments between a guy named "Phyllis from Mulga" and another guy who thinks Nick Saban is a deity.

And this, apparently, is his primary qualification. His supporters will say he has his finger on the pulse of Alabama. For 35 years, they’ll argue, he’s been listening to the "real people" of the state.

What he's been listening to is raw, unfiltered, often irrational id. He's been marinating in it. Does that prepare you to legislate on healthcare policy, foreign relations, or the national debt? Or does it just train you to treat every complex issue like a rivalry game where the only goal is to make the other side miserable? I think we all know the answer to that. The skills that make you a successful talk show host—stoking outrage, simplifying complex issues into us-vs-them binaries, giving a platform to the loudest voice in the room—are the very same skills that are actively destroying our political discourse.

It’s all just becoming one big content stream, isn’t it? I pay my cable bill and I get a thousand channels of people yelling. Some are yelling about `georgia football`, some are yelling about tax law. The tone is the same. The production value is the same. The goal is the same: keep me angry, keep me watching. And now we’re just merging the channels. Finebaum isn't leaving media for politics. He's just accepting a promotion to a bigger show. A show with a nicer set in Washington D.C., but it's the same damn show. And honestly, I’m just so tired of...

The Sad Truth: The Senate is Just Another Call-in Show

So, What Now?

Look, maybe I’m the crazy one here. Maybe in a state as deeply red as Alabama, the normal rules of political gravity don't apply. Maybe the idea of a seasoned legislator or a policy wonk is just some quaint, outdated fantasy I’m clinging to.

Perhaps the `paul finebaum senate` campaign is the most honest thing to happen in politics in years. It’s an open admission that it’s all about celebrity, it’s all about the show, and it’s all about who can yell the loudest. He’s got the name recognition. He knows the game. He's facing a field of relatively generic politicians like Steve Marshall and Barry Moore. In that context, is he really the worst choice?

God, that’s a depressing thought.

The fact that I even have to ask that question feels like a defeat. The fact that a man's primary political asset is his decades-long career spent refereeing arguments about whether a quarterback deserves a Heisman trophy… it just says everything about where we are. He'll have to make a decision in the next month or so. He’ll have to decide if he wants to trade his radio studio for the Senate floor.

They’re basically the same thing now, anyway.

Just What We Needed, Another Show ###

Let's be real. This isn't about public service. It's about brand extension. It's the logical, inevitable endpoint of a culture that has replaced civics with celebrity and debate with rage-bait. We get the leaders we deserve, and apparently, we deserve a professional outrage wrangler. Good luck to us all.

Reference article source：

• Paul Finebaum says he is considering running for U.S. Senate
• 'China Ain't Played Bama, Pawl!': Paul Finebaum considering Alabama Senate run in 2026
• Paul Finebaum ‘seriously considering’ run for Senate in Alabama’s GOP primary