United States President Donald Trump said on Sunday night that he had been joking when he publicly offered UFC chief executive Dana White the job of White House press secretary. His clarification followed hours of speculation prompted by a Saturday social media post that presented the mixed martial arts executive as his choice for the vacant position.
Speaking on an airport tarmac in West Palm Beach, Florida, Trump told reporters: “I was only kidding. But Dana loves the idea.” In his earlier Truth Social message, Trump said White had been offered the role and suggested that fighters including Islam Makhachev and Khabib Nurmagomedov could accompany him as assistants. Photographs of fighters appeared alongside the post.
The episode comes as Trump continues to operate without a chief spokesperson. The press secretary position has been empty since October 16, following political commentator Katie Zacharia’s five-day tenure, the shortest in the position’s history. Critics challenged her legal credentials and performance. Her first briefing ended within 15 minutes after she struggled with her opening remarks.
Republican strategist Rob Arlett, a former Trump campaign manager in Delaware, told Al Jazeera he believed the president’s suggestion was partly serious. Arlett described publicly floating proposals as a way for Trump to attract attention, measure opinion and consider his next steps. He also pointed to the longstanding friendship and business ties between Trump and White as reasons the idea might have appealed to the president.
Their relationship stretches back to the UFC’s early commercial struggles. White became its president in 2001 after Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta purchased the company for $2m. With critics attacking the competition as excessively violent and insufficiently regulated, Trump hosted UFC events at his Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City during White’s first year in charge and again the following year. White has credited that support with helping the organisation gain wider acceptance.
White endorsed Trump’s presidential campaign in December 2015 and subsequently campaigned for him in the 2016, 2020 and 2024 elections. His financial support included a $1m donation in 2020 to America First Action, a political action committee backing Trump. Over the weekend, White said he planned to meet the president in Washington on Monday, but appeared dismissive of taking an administration role, telling reporters: “I’ve got a lot of jobs already.”
White, who has served as UFC chief executive as well as president since 2023, has no government experience. Ihsan Alkhatib, a lawyer and political science professor at Murray State University in Kentucky, told Al Jazeera that Trump favours unconventional choices. However, he said White lacked the skills required for the spokesperson’s position.
A White appointment could also have drawn scrutiny over a video posted on social media in 2022 showing him slapping his wife, Anne Stella, during an argument at a New Year’s Eve party in Mexico. White subsequently apologised and said the criticism was warranted. With Trump withdrawing the suggestion, the search for a successor to Zacharia remains unresolved.
