Brooke Hogan insists her dad is ''not racist''.

The 27-year-old daughter of wrestler Hulk Hogan has launched a staunch defence of her father after a tape emerged of him repeatedly using the N-word during an outburst eight years ago, saying the incident isn't reflective of his character and that he's an ''easy target'' for critics.

Brooke said: ''He's my dad, I love him and the reason I'm standing by his side on this whole thing is because I know him, and it's so easy for people to just - they need something to jump down people's backs about. He's an easy target.''

Brooke explained that her father - whose real name is Terry Bollea - was at a particularly low ebb following the collapse of his marriage to Linda Hogan, and those personal woes drove him to make the foul-mouthed rant.

She said: ''I understand when people are writing me mean tweets and saying your dad's this and [that] ... [but] I wish I could talk to them and just say, 'Have you ever been really mad at somebody and just said the worst about them?' ... It's not that my dad thinks that, and that's not how we were raised.''

Brooke also said her father is a close pal of 'A-Team' star Mr. T and former basketball player Dennis Rodman, proving his rant was a one-off mistake.

She told 'Entertainment Tonight': ''My dad's best friends with Mr. T, he's best friends with Dennis Rodman, he's not racist.

''It's just when you're mad and you're at the lowest point in your life .... you just choose ill-fitting words for that situation just to air your shorts out.

''He's so nice to everybody. He doesn't talk like that, which is what was so strange about it.''