Dana White remembers reaction to Donald Trump backing rival MMA promotion over UFC

UFC CEO Dana White has become a close friend and one of the staunchest advocates for President Donald Trump over the past eight-plus years, but there was a time when the two friends were actually on opposites sides—at least when it came to business.

Trump famously backed the UFC when the organization was struggling to find venues to host events in the early 2000s, and he offered up the arenas connected to his New Jersey casinos and hotels after Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta bought the promotion and worked to breathe new life into it. That partnership made White a lifetime fan of Trump, but in 2008 the future president decided he was going to get into the fight game after he decided to lend his name and celebrity to the fledgling Affliction promotion headed up by executive Tom Atencio.

At the time, Affliction was quick to position itself as a rival to the UFC, signing several prominent athletes with past experience in the promotion. The debut event even went head to head with a UFC card that same night, but for all the ways White never pulls punches when addressing companies trying to cut into his bottom line, he never took aim at Trump for getting into business with Affliction.

“He did [launch his own promotion],” White recounted when speaking about Trump to Forbes. “That’s funny. What happened was I want to say it was TMZ was interviewing me one time and they’re like ‘Donald Trump’s about to go head to head with you, what do you have to say about that?’ I said, I’ll never say anything bad about Donald Trump.

“Donald Trump was good to us. But it’s a testament to how much he likes fighting and what he saw in the UFC back in those days.”

While Affliction was there and gone in an instant with only two shows before a third was cancelled—the promotion crumbled shortly thereafter—White swears he never felt bothered that Trump got into bed with another MMA organization that wasn’t UFC.

“Not at all [threatened],” White said. “It’s the exact opposite. They were trying to get me to say something bad about him, and I said I never will. This guy was there in the beginning, he’s always been a good friend to me.”

As much as White always touted himself as a big fan of Trump after he supported the UFC in the early 2000’s, he recalls a shift in the dynamic when the former host of The Apprentice decided to take a run at the presidency during the 2016 election.

That’s when Trump approached White about speaking on his behalf at the Republican National Convention and the offer changed their relationship forever.

“In 2015, when he hit me up and said, ‘Would you speak at the Republican convention for me?’ He started out with ‘if you don’t want to do it, I completely understand,’” White relayed. “Everybody told me not to do it. Everybody said don’t get involved in this and he’s never going to win, it’s not worth it.

“I said, this guy’s been a good guy to me, I’ll do it. When I spoke in [2015], our relationship, that’s when we really started to become good friends.”

White’s ties with Trump got even deeper during his run for re-election in 2024 with the UFC executive stumping for him throughout the year, speaking for him again at the Republican National Convention and even taking the stage during his celebration after winning this past November.