America goes full-tilt satire as Trump announces he's holding UFC fights at the White House now

This is per CNN, reporting on comments made tonight by President Donald Trump, suggesting that he intends to bring his old buddy, Ultimate Fighting Championship president Dana White, in to hold a cage match at the White House. (And while we normally do not spend a lot of time thinking “thank you” toward White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, we do have to be grateful that she later confirmed to press that Trump was “deadly serious” about scheduling the bout, because the increasingly absurd nature of American life has really begun to make some of this stuff kind of blurry.)

White and Trump have been friends for years, with the UFC CEO representing one of the hydra-esque heads of the testosterone-huffing, supplement-slinging male insecurity industry that Trump tapped to some success in the 2024 election. (Among other things, White introduced Trump at the Republican National Convention last year, and Trump has lent the dignity of his office to several of the company’s fights in recent months.) UFC has confirmed that it’s looking into setting up a UFC bout at the White House some time in 2026, although no one has yet specified where on the grounds it might end up being set up. (We assume outside, but fuck it, why not directly in the Oval Office? Get a little blood-mixed-with-body-spray splashed on the ol’ Resolute desk.)

(By the way: If your job doesn’t involve looking up which of the six extant Oval Office desks Trump uses so you can make that joke, your job is not as weird as ours.)

Trump announced his modern gladiatorial game during a speech in Des Moines on Thursday night, pitching it as part of his planned “America 250” events celebrating the 250th anniversary of the country’s founding next year. God knows what it ramps up to from here; given how Trump’s treated his old friends at the WWE, we should count ourselves lucky if White hasn’t been named as Secretary Of Labor by the time the year is out.