President Donald Trump has recently proposed a never-before-seen occurrence: a UFC event on the White House grounds to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the country’s independence on July 4, 2026. The news got picked up by seemingly every single outlet in existence and got some of the fighters fired up.
“Dana [White] is going to do it. Dana is great. One of a kind. Going to have a UFC fight — championship fight, full fight — like 20, 25,000 people, and we’re going to do that as part of 250.”
It is apparent that the promotion has close ties to the Republican Party and Trump in particular. This relationship has been the worst-kept secret in combat sports for decades, given the personal history between White and Trump.
Still, to say such an announcement was expected would be a lie. Furthermore, the news was solidified by a UFC spokesperson to NBC News.
“I don’t tell anybody how to vote,” White stated in an interview with Yahoo Sports in August 2024. “I don’t tell anybody how to think. I just tell everybody my relationship that I’ve had with [Trump] for twenty-something years and who he really is.”
When asked about Trump’s Vince McMahon-like walkouts during several UFC events, White mentioned the fans’ excitement and discussed a scenario where Joe Biden happened to be an attendee.
“You see the way the crowd reacts to it? Off the charts […] If Biden came to a UFC event, I would treat Biden the same way,” White said.
Almost a year after the interview, the UFC CEO’s words don’t sound very genuine. He’s become one of the loudest public voices in Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign. He even made an appearance at the New York Trump rally.
There is a history to White’s friendship with the current U.S. President, as the Trump Taj Mahal hosted UFC events from 2000 to 2001, when the sport was frowned upon by the nation’s governing bodies. One could argue that this gesture launched the ongoing partnership between the two.
White supported Trump in his 2016 and 2020 campaigns, too, praising his ally in several interviews. Yet it went above and beyond in 2024, leading to a UFC-sponsored military parade in June this year.
A number of UFC fighters have already called for the opportunity to fight at the White House grounds. Among many are Conor McGregor and Jon Jones, neither of whom is an active competitor today.
Other notable candidates include: Merab Dvalishvili, Terence McKinney, Billy Quarantillo, and Karolina Kowalkiewicz.
A promotional trick to ride headlines or a genuine announcement, the idea of a UFC on the White House grounds sounds ridiculous. That would become worldwide news and go way beyond the MMA sphere itself.
The ethical part of such close relationships between Trump and White, as the UFC has several ongoing legal disputes, is questionable at best.
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