Dana White has spent the past several weeks making media appearances ahead of the UFC’s planned White House event on June 14, speaking with major outlets such as the New Yorker, Time, and Rolling Stone. One particular interview, however, drew heavy criticism from MMA analyst Luke Thomas, who dedicated an entire episode of Luke Thomas Gets Political to challenging White’s repeated claim that he is “not a political guy.”
White made the comment during a conversation with New Yorker editor David Remnick, continuing a defense he has used for years whenever questions about his relationship with Donald Trump arise.
According to Thomas, that explanation does not hold up under scrutiny.
White’s argument, as Thomas summarized it, rests on two points. First, White maintains that his speeches at the Republican National Convention were personal acts of loyalty rather than political endorsements.
Second, White argues that he still identifies more with older Democrats from the 1980s and 1990s and does not agree with Trump on every issue.
Thomas rejected both defenses outright.
The argument, as Thomas laid it out, is not about White’s privately held beliefs. Instead, Thomas argued that the real issue is the level of public support White has repeatedly provided Trump during politically vulnerable moments.
Thomas specifically pointed to the aftermath of January 6, Trump’s criminal convictions, and the various federal indictments tied to the former president. According to Thomas, the UFC became a platform that helped rehabilitate Trump’s public image at critical moments.
At each of those junctures, the UFC provided Trump with the kind of rehabilitative platform that, in Thomas’s words, money cannot buy.
The discussion also turned toward immigration after Remnick brought up the fact that many UFC athletes are immigrants or come from disadvantaged backgrounds. White defended Trump’s immigration policies by arguing that the administration simply wants immigrants to come into the country legally.
Thomas pushed back hard on that characterization.
He referenced USCIS policy changes that allegedly blocked certain green card applications despite applicants having legal standing. He also mentioned enforcement operations involving legal immigrants and restrictions placed on entire country-of-origin immigration categories.
“Nothing you can do about it,” Thomas said sarcastically while criticizing the administration’s approach.
Thomas later pointed to comments White made during UFC 309, where Trump attended following the 2024 election. Speaking to the crowd at the event, White declared: “The only states she [Kamala Harris] won were the ones that you didn’t need ID to vote in.”
The podcast host also highlighted White’s admitted role in encouraging Joe Rogan to engage more directly in politics during the election cycle.
According to Thomas, White advised Rogan that limiting Trump appearances to Fox News would hurt his campaign and that podcasts represented a better path toward expanding his audience reach.
Rogan eventually endorsed Trump, while personalities like Tim Dillon, Theo Von, and Andrew Schulz also expressed varying degrees of support throughout the election cycle.
Thomas ended the discussion with a blunt assessment of White’s public positioning. “He can only think you’re stupid,” Thomas said. “He can only think people are so dumb that they can’t do basic fact-checking around this.”
