(AFP) – The White House is to play host to a mixed martial arts bout on July 4 next year, the day the United States marks the 250th anniversary of its founding, UFC boss Dana White said Tuesday. President Donald Trump has been a regular guest at the often-bloody contests, where fighters punch, kick and grapple with their opponent in a no-holds-barred battle to submission or knockout. Bringing the brutal combat sport to the center of US political power will mark a historic first.
“It is definitely going to happen,” White, a high-profile supporter of the US president, told CBS television. “I talked to him last night — ‘him’ being the president — and I’m flying out there at the end of this month, and I’m going to sit down and walk him through all the plans and the renderings, and we’re going to start deciding what he wants and doesn’t want.”
Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) is the largest and most successful organization in the burgeoning world of MMA, a blend of martial arts disciplines like jiu-jitsu, kickboxing, boxing and wrestling. Bouts take place in an eight-sided ring — dubbed “The Octagon” — bounded by a chainlink fence. With few exceptions — like eye-gouging — male and female fighters are allowed to employ almost any technique to attack their opponent. Fights often end with a prone fighter being pummeled in the face as they lie on the bloodied floor, before the referee steps in to stop the action.
The shaven-headed White, who has regularly spoken warmly of Trump as both a friend and a political leader, said the president’s daughter would be involved in organizing the Independence Day spectacle at the White House. “When (Trump) called me and asked me to do it, he said: ‘I want Ivanka in the middle of this,'” White told CBS, whose parent company Paramount has just signed a $7.7 billion streaming deal with UFC.
White took over the UFC in 2001 when it was a small, loss-making organization, shepherding it into one of the fastest-growing sports promotion companies in the world. The sport’s popularity with young men — a key demographic in the 2024 US election — and Trump’s long association with the UFC, have made the president a regular fixture at some of its more high-profile events, where he is greeted like a rock star. Its brutal nature and high injury rate mean the sport is controversial, with doctors decrying the potential for brain damage amongst fighters who are repeatedly hit in the head, though it has gained increasing mainstream acceptance in recent years.
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