Construction crews have been busy on the South Lawn of the White House, and President Donald Trump could not be more enthusiastic about what is taking shape there. An octagon-style cage is being erected for what Trump has billed as an unprecedented UFC event, one he has been championing since last year.
According to sources, a financial disclosure revealed that Trump had purchased between $15,000 and $50,000 worth of stock in TKO Group Holdings (the parent company of UFC) just weeks before ramping up his public promotion of the event.
The stock purchase, made on March 25 and reported in a May financial disclosure, placed Trump under fresh scrutiny from government watchdog groups.
Jordan Libowitz of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington pointed out that the president is actively using the prestige of the White House to draw attention to a company in which he now holds a personal financial stake. The White House did not respond to requests for comment on the purchase.
Trump, for his part, has shown little hesitation in expressing his enthusiasm. During a recent public appearance where he gave media a look at the construction underway on the grounds, he described the setting in sweeping terms.
“It’s right at the front door to the White House,” Trump said. “You’ll never see it again. It’s never happened before and you’ll never see it again.”
He went on to predict the event would be a landmark moment not just for the sport, but for television history.
“The UFC is going to have all their best athletes. The best in the world, they’re all coming that night. They all say we want to compete at the White House,” Trump said. “This would be the highest rated event, maybe one of them ever in sports.”
Trump reserved particular praise for UFC president Dana White, who has been a close political ally and supporter for years. The two share a relationship dating back to UFC’s early days, when Trump extended opportunities to the organization at a time when others looked the other way.
“Dana is an amazing man. He’s done an amazing job,” Trump said. “What he’s done is amazing. I’m not sure anybody could have done it but him. You don’t usually say that, but not many people could have. He’s a very special man.”
Trump also emphasized the public-facing nature of the celebrations, noting they would extend well beyond the White House fence line.
“This is going and it’s all free,” he said. “We’re going to have over 100,000, maybe 100,000 people in the park across the street, eight giant screens, and all free.”
The event is set for June 14, which coincides with Trump’s birthday, and is being positioned as part of commemorations marking America’s 250th anniversary. Earlier in the month, Trump welcomed UFC athletes to the Oval Office and circulated AI-generated renderings depicting a full cage setup on the South Lawn surrounded by thousands of spectators.
The excitement surrounding the event has not quieted the concerns of government ethics experts. Norm Eisen, who served as an ethics adviser during the Obama administration, argued that deploying government resources and the symbolic weight of the White House for an event tied to a company in which the president personally owns stock crosses a boundary that previous administrations had been careful to respect.
Trump’s expanding financial portfolio has also become a topic of conversation in media circles. On a recent episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, host Joe Rogan and comedian Tom Segura spent time dissecting the broader problem of elected officials trading stocks on information unavailable to the general public, before the conversation turned toward Trump specifically.
Rogan pulled up a chart tracking the stock market performance of members of Congress relative to the S&P 500, comparing results across party lines. He acknowledged that percentage-based charts can sometimes distort reality but argued the overall pattern was unmistakable.
“When you look at the chart and you look at the difference between the Republicans and Democrats in terms of insider trading in Congress, they’re all doing it,” Rogan said.
Segura offered no pushback. “They’re all doing it,” he replied.
Rogan suggested the bipartisan nature of the practice is precisely what allows it to go unaddressed. “That’s why they can do it,” he said. “If it was only the Democrats, the Republicans would be like, ‘What the f**k, bro?’ But since they’re all doing it, everybody’s like, ‘Well, there’s a problem. There’s no problem. Huh? I don’t see nothing.'”
Rogan expressed doubt that anyone in a position of real power had ever faced meaningful consequences, suggesting accountability had mostly landed on those who were already expendable.
“A few blabbermouths probably, some outsider, some that they were like, ‘F**k him. Throw him under the bus,'” Rogan said. “They probably had a few guys they threw under the bus and it’s probably somebody that didn’t have a portfolio.”
Segura noted the difficulty of resisting temptation when the opportunity presents itself. “That’s a tough thing to resist, to be sitting in Congress,” he said. Rogan added the element that makes that temptation nearly irresistible: “and you know you’re not going to get punished.”
The discussion then turned to Trump directly. “Didn’t Trump do a lot of like stock purchases?” Rogan asked. Segura’s answer was blunt. “He’s made a fortune. He’s made a fortune in this,” he said.
