# Dana White The president and chief executive of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, and one of the clearest single illustrations of how the combat-sports business, Silicon Valley and the Trump political operation have grown into one another. White has run the UFC since 2001, turning a near-bankrupt fight promotion into a global media property. He joined [[Meta]]'s board of directors in January 2025 as part of [[Mark Zuckerberg]]'s realignment toward the incoming administration, alongside the end of third-party fact-checking and the installation of a Republican operative as head of global affairs. His friendship with [[Donald Trump]] is old and rooted in a favour. In November 2000 and February 2001, when mainstream venues wanted nothing to do with a sport one senator had called human cockfighting, the promotion's first sanctioned events ran at the Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City. White has repaid it in kind ever since, introducing Trump at two Republican National Conventions and speaking at his election-night victory parties. In 2026 the relationship produced a UFC match staged on the White House grounds as part of the administration's America-250 programming, run through [[Freedom 250]]; the chief executive of the UFC's parent company said afterwards that the event lost money. ## The press secretary offer On **7 November 2026**, four days after Republicans lost both chambers of Congress, Trump announced on [[Truth Social]] that he had offered White the job of White House press secretary. The post is worth reading in full for what it says about how the administration understands the role: > [!quote] Donald Trump, Truth Social, 7 November 2026 > "I am pleased to announce that the Great Dana White, a violent Fighter and Warrior, has been offered the job of Press Secretary of the United States. I have requested that he bring with him assistants, even though some are not from our Country, of Islam Makhachev, Khabib Nurmagomedov, Justin Gaethje, Daniel Cormier, Amanda Nunes, and Kayla Harris." > > "We need these people to defend us against the Lunatic Left. Dana will be a Press Secretary like none other. Dana, please take the job!" The podium had been empty since October. [[Karoline Leavitt]] left at the end of August 2026; [[Katie Zacharia]] was named on 9 October and out on 16 October after a single briefing. An offer to a fight promoter, framed as the recruitment of professional fighters to physically defend the administration against its critics, is a statement about what the White House wants from a briefing room — not a press secretary but a cornerman. White responded on Instagram with a photograph of himself at the briefing-room podium captioned "On to the next chapter," then reposted Trump's announcement. > [!warning] Unresolved > Whether White takes the job is unsettled. CNN reported the same day, citing a single source, that he had declined; the Boston Globe reported that he would meet Trump to discuss it. The White House did not confirm the offer when asked. The offer itself, and Trump's wording, are confirmed by multiple outlets and by the post. ## Why it matters here White sits at the junction of three networks this knowledge base tracks separately. He is a director of one of the largest social-media companies in the world, at a moment when that company has dismantled its own fact-checking apparatus. He is a personal friend of the president with no government experience being offered one of the most visible jobs in the executive branch. And he runs a sport whose iconography — the fight, the cage, the warrior — the administration borrows constantly to describe politics itself. Trump's announcement did not treat the resemblance as a metaphor. ## See also - [[Donald Trump]] · [[Truth Social]] — where the offer was announced - [[Mark Zuckerberg]] · [[Meta]] — the board he joined in January 2025 - [[Freedom 250]] — the anniversary programming that staged a UFC match at the White House - [[Karoline Leavitt]] · [[Katie Zacharia]] — the two previous press secretaries of the second term