NEW YORK – UFC 244 proved to be a big night for the UFC, and a proud Dana White sat down at the dais for the post-fight press conference a contented man.
The capacity crowd and huge gate receipts would have contributed to that, as would the spectacular fights the fans were treated to throughout an action-packed night at Madison Square Garden. But the cherry on top of the cake for the UFC president was being able to host the President of the United States himself, as Donald Trump took his place in the second row to watch the fights from close quarters.
The presence of the Commander-In-Chief warranted a heavy amount of additional security and drew even more attention to the event. And White admitted the presence of his good friend certainly added to the occasion, even though he was initially a little unsure of Trump’s decision to attend.
“He called me the night that he was elected and told me to get down to the afterparty, and I went, and he wanted to come to the Conor McGregor fight the next night. Obviously he didn’t know what he didn’t know at the time, how crazy it would be. And then he called me the next morning and said: ‘You know what? I’m going to ruin your event. I think it will ruin it. They’ll have to shut everything down, and I don’t think it’s a good idea. Let’s plan this again when there’s more time to plan.’”
Trump made good on his word when he told White he planned to attend Saturday night’s event at The Garden, and it briefly sent White into a spin.
“We had dinner last Thursday at the White House, and he said ‘I’m coming. I’m coming to New York’. And I was like ‘Oh my god! That’s going to be a rough one! Why don’t we do Vegas on the 14th (December)? And New York was the only one that he could do, so he came tonight.”
White’s relationship with the President goes back to the early Zuffa days, when then-hotel magnate Trump played host to UFC 28, UFC 30 and UFC 31 at his Trump Taj Mahal hotel in Atlantic City. The pair struck up a relationship and have remained friends ever since.
“Everything that ever happened to me in my career, Trump was the first guy to pick up the phone and reach out to me,” White said. “From getting back on pay-per-view, getting our first TV deal when we did the big FOX deal, the guy always reached out to me.”
While the reception to Trump in the arena could be described as mixed, Trump himself described it as “a little bit like walking into a Trump Rally.” White said he was pleased with the way the New York crowd conducted itself when he walked Trump to his seat midway through the preliminary card.
“Whoever you are, this is America. You can believe or do whatever you want. If you want to boo, you can boo,” White said. “As an American, you can do whatever you want to do, and you can choose whatever side you want to be on. So I just felt like tonight we were going to walk in and whatever happened, happened. The guy told me as a friend he was coming to see the fights, and he did tonight, and I appreciate him, and it was a big night for the sport.”
White said the moment he walked Trump out into the main bowl of the arena was special for him, personally. “I’ve walked out of that tunnel for the last 20 years, (and) I’ve never (expletive) seen anything like that in my life like tonight when I walked out of that tunnel with him,” White said. “I’ll never forget it as long as I live. It was crazy.”
And while White acknowledged the polarized state of American politics in 2019, he said that, for the UFC as an organization and MMA as a sport, it was a landmark moment to have the President attending the event.
“Tonight wasn’t about how you feel politically about the president,” White said. “We weren’t legal in New York because of some political (expletive) a few years ago. Tonight, the President of the United States was here, watching a UFC event.
“They wanted him in a suite, of course, (but) he doesn’t listen to them. He does what he wants to do. But yeah, they wanted him in a suite. I’m not an expert in security, but I think it’s a lot easier to protect him in a suite than it is in the second row. But, again, testament to our fans. It’s our President. It’s the President of the United States, man. And tonight I was happy and proud that the crowd here in New York treated him with respect and just made the night so much cooler. Everything was so cool tonight.”
'A big night for the sport': Dana White reflects on President Trump's UFC 244 visit
