The Tribune

By Charlie Harper

THE northeastern US has been enjoying San Diego-type weather for much of this month of June, and the cool nights and mostly dry, cloudless days of 75-degree warmth have offered a salving context for what now seems like ordinary news.

There was an exception to the fine weather. One thundershower outburst on Sunday evening caused a delay in one of the more amazing events to occur during this crazy second term of Donald Trump’s US presidency.

That was the staging of an Ultimate Fighting Championship event on the south lawn of the White House. Founded in 1993 as a forum for martial arts combat, UFC began to grow and prosper at the beginning of this century, and has now evolved into a lucrative corporate venture that grossed over $1.5 billion last year.

The enterprising leader of UFC has for the past quarter century been Dana White, a college dropout and former bar bouncer whose innate entrepreneurial instincts and showmanship have led the firm to prominence and riches. White, who often dresses in black and effortlessly projects a tough-guy image with his shaved head and pugilistic jaw, is the perfect front man for UFC.

White and UFC are also natural allies for president Trump and have been for well over a decade, given the anti-establishment, unconventional, alienated and muscular perspective they share.

White spoke at the 2016 Republican National Convention, where he endorsed then-Republican nominee Donald Trump. White recalled at that convention that Trump had helped the UFC in its early days, allowing the UFC to host its first event at the Trump Taj Mahal resort in Atlantic City when other venues refused to host the UFC. According to news accounts at the time, White said "no arenas wanted us. This guy reached out, and he's always been a friend to me."

White reiterated his support for Trump for the 2020 election and, in February 2020, he donated $1 million to America First Action, a heavyweight political action committee that supported Trump's re-election bid. He again endorsed Trump during the 2024 election campaign and introduced him at the 2024 Republican National Convention.

More recently, White was present at the 2026 White House Correspondents' Dinner shooting in April, and he reportedly boasted afterwards that he ignored commands from authorities when they stormed the room while Trump evacuated the scene. 

"Tables getting flipped over, guys running in with guns and they were screaming 'Get down.' I didn't get down,” White recalled. “It was awesome. I literally took every minute of it in, and it was a pretty crazy, unique experience. We were sitting right in front of the table, right in front of where the president was.”

Macho bravado aside, it’s pretty clear that Dana White and Donald Trump are in many ways meant for each other. And it has been a very effective and helpful alliance for both of them.

The setup for Sunday’s birthday bash (Trump turned 80 on that day) took weeks to perfect, and the giant steel infrastructure housing the matches towered over the White House, temporarily altering a perspective unchanged for generations and legally enshrined in century-old federal legislation called the Height Act of 1910 that prohibited construction of Washington DC office or commercial buildings above certain specified heights. The result is the skyscraper-free scene you see when regarding panoramic views of America’s capital city.

The setup process for Sunday’s extravaganza, which began May 20, was a coordinated effort on a tight timeline with significant security constraints.

Every day, 20 to 30 trucks filled with UFC equipment such as staging infrastructure were screened before installation on White House grounds. The buildout required 700 to 900 subcontractors with specialized knowledge for each element of the construction. By all accounts, the logistics were handled professionally.

According to CNN’s web site, creating an arena with seating for 4,000 audience members and broadcast capabilities on the White House South Lawn, plus a fan festival for more than 100,000 guests on the Ellipse just to the south of the White House campus, was a massive production requiring huge investment, a year of planning and weeks of setup.

After all the celebrations were over, breakdown of the structure started early Monday with removal of security provisions, including pedestrian barriers and anti-scale fencing. Throughout the mornings earlier this week, merchandise trailers were set to depart, food and beverage operators were slated to start dismantling their vendor stalls, and broadcast equipment was dismantled. US Secret Service began removing the magnetometers and tenting around the security screening areas.

On Tuesday, portable restrooms were loaded out, camera towers and staging came down. It continued throughout the week as interior fencing, power and tents, and bleachers were removed. By tomorrow, according to a schedule reportedly sourced to UFC, total event load-out should be complete. Early next week, dumpsters will be taken away and exterior fencing will be removed.

Why is it not a surprise that after such expense and careful planning and execution, the biggest takeaway from Trump’s birthday fight card is the crude comment of one of the winning fighters?

After winning the biggest fight of his career Sunday night on the South Lawn of the White House, UFC heavyweight Josh Hokit aimed an unexpected insult in his post-fight interview at former first lady Michelle Obama. "Michelle Obama is a man," Hokit said. "Am I right, America?"

Reaction from spectators on South Lawn was reportedly mostly shocked silence. On the Ellipse south of the White House, where tens of thousands of people gathered for a UFC Freedom 250 watch party, Hokit’s disparaging comment about Obama drew mixed reactions. There were some cheers and some equally quizzical looks at what the fighter had just said.

Trump and White, often seen as encouraging and even facilitating such brazen, bigoted outrageousness, had the good sense to disavow or ignore Hokit’s comment.

Meantime, in what appeared to some observers as almost an afterthought, the president announced that hostilities in the Iran war had ceased. Trump said he expected to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with Iran tomorrow. 

It may be significant in this context that just a week ago, the US Congress had finally mustered the resolve to flex its muscles in opposition to a war initiated by Trump that has proven to be overwhelmingly unpopular with American voters at a critical time, when polls suggest that Americans are just beginning to focus their attention on November’s elections for control of the US House of Representatives and Senate.

The US House last Wednesday had voted to direct Trump to withdraw US forces from the conflict with Iran or win approval from Congress to continue the war, after four Republicans sided with Democrats in a sign of growing opposition to a military campaign that began on the last day of February.

Details of the Trump-Iran MOU were not immediately available, leading to widespread speculation and much criticism of the reported deal. The president said that the Strait of Hormuz would reopen tomorrow after the MOU was signed. He continued to reassure Americans (and many other concerned citizens in Europe and the Middle East) that the US would continue to not permit Iran to develop a nuclear weapon, and noted that the new 60-day cease fire established by the MOU would enable further discussions on this sensitive issue. But there were different interpretations of what the MOU actually says and means.

CBS News reported on Tuesday that Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guard said that under the agreement, their country will receive half of its roughly $24 billion in long-frozen funds before final negotiations begin during the ceasefire extension. US vice president J D Vance disagreed on TV, asserting that Iran will get none of the money until it demonstrates compliance with the deal's terms.

Meanwhile, Israel continues to bombard southern Lebanon to defeat Hezbollah. Israeli officials said their country is not bound by the MOU to end its fight with Hezbollah nor to pull its forces out of Lebanon. President Trump, Pakistani mediators, and Iran have all said the deal includes a cessation of hostilities on all fronts, including in Lebanon.

It sounds like there are a few details still to be worked out.