Brooke Hogan is reflecting on her late father Hulk Hogan’s infamous — and racist — 2012 sex tape.
“That was so rough,” Brooke, 37, exclusively told Us Weekly on Friday, April 10, recalling the moments that followed her father seemingly bemoaning the fact that she was dating a Black man on tape.
“It’s so crazy. My dad got so much, like, ‘Oh my gosh, poor Hulk. He’s going through this. He’s fighting the sex tape thing.’ I’m like, ‘What about us?’ We were the subject of it,” she added. “It was the most embarrassing thing in the world. It was terrible.”
Hulk referenced Brooke’s then-boyfriend Yannique Barker on the sex tape, using the n-word multiple times and verbally admitting he was “racist, to a point.”
“Me and Yannique really went through it when that sex tape came out, and it tore us apart,” Brooke explained.
Audio from Hulk’s sex tape was leaked by TMZ and RadarOnline in July 2015. In 2016, Hulk won a $115 million judgment against Gawker for the unauthorized publication of the tape.
The sex tape was enough for WWE to cut ties with Hulk at the time, though he would return to the company for various appearances before his death in July 2025.
Despite the pain of the fallout, Brooke and Yannique’s story recently took a surprising turn when Brooke reconnected with SoBe Entertainment — founded by Yannique’s father — to continue her music career.
“It’s really cool because Yannique now has a son, and me and my husband, Steve, have our babies,” Brooke said. “Our babies met and my husband and Yannique are friends. All the parts of my heart are coming back together. Not in the way I had planned, but in a very special way.”
Brooke married her husband, former NHL player Steve Oleksy, in 2022. The couple welcomed twins Oliver and Molly in 2025.
Hulk died after suffering a heart attack at his home in Florida. He was 71 years old. At the time of his death, Hulk and Brooke hadn’t spoken for “two years.”
“He said, ‘You go this way, I go that way,’” Brooke told Us about their estrangement. “That hurt. I think that’s what makes me the most annoying member of my family. They know that I will just beat you up until you do the right thing. I could see what was happening with him with the people around him. I could also see his potential and see how life could be. And he just wasn’t there.”
She added, “I don’t know if we would have ever reconnected, even if he were alive, because of the mindset he was in. He would have had to have a change of mindset and a change of company. I don’t know if he was there. I don’t know if he was willing to do that.”
