Dana White says Josh Hokit undercut what he viewed as a historic UFC White House night with a remark White called gross, inappropriate and moronic.
White addressed the fallout during a new appearance on The Pivot, where Ryan Clark pressed him on Hokit’s false post-fight comment about Michelle Obama at UFC Freedom 250. White defended his broader free-speech stance, but said the UFC did not share Hokit’s view and that the moment damaged an otherwise successful event.
Earlier in the same exchange, White said his free-speech position has not changed even when he dislikes what is being said.
“Well, unfortunately, when you talk about freedom of speech, it’s usually the grossest stuff that has to be protected. It’s like, you can’t talk about freedom of speech and then pick and choose. I don’t love it all the time, but it is what it is. I mean, in this country we do have it.”
“You see what starts to happen around the rest of the world in these places where people are being arrested for what they’re posting on social media and stuff like that. It’s a slippery slope. You don’t want to head down that path, and we don’t ever want to be there.”
“But yeah, I don’t, I don’t love my stance on freedom of speech all the time, but it has to be protected.”
White then shifted to the White House event itself. He said the idea began when the president suggested a fight at the White House, and he repeated that he viewed the invitation as bigger than party politics.
“Listen, when the president of the United States leans over and says to you, ‘Hey, we should do a fight at the White House,’ yes. Yes, we should.”
“Anybody to not want to go to the White House, it’s not about politics. And you have these guys that’ll be like, and it happened during the Biden administration, Biden is not my president. I got some bad news for you. If you’re an American citizen, he is the president of the United States. He is your president.”
White also recalled a past interaction with Barack Obama at Donald Trump’s inauguration, saying Obama congratulated him despite their public political differences.
“President Obama turned around to me, only president that did, and said, ‘Hey, congratulations on all your success.’ And I said, ‘Thank you, Mr. President.’ Couldn’t have been a nicer guy. Couldn’t have been classier.”
“I respect the position of president of the United States no matter who it is, whether I agree with, you’re never going to agree with 100% of any president’s politics or any of that [expletive]. But this is the president of the United States. The majority of Americans in this country voted this person into office and they’re going to be there for four years and they are the president and I respect that.”
The Pivot answer sits on top of a longer fallout: White had already ripped Hokit’s Michelle Obama insult after UFC Freedom 250, Joe Rogan said Hokit should have been kept off the White House lawn, Daniel Cormier called the remarks completely uncalled for, and Hokit later described the line as a compliment.
White Says Hokit Did Not Speak For UFC
Clark’s follow-up put the focus directly back on Hokit’s line about Michelle Obama and asked whether the UFC could have publicly separated itself from the comment in the moment or afterward.
“If President Obama turns around and shows you that sort of grace when Josh Hokit says what he says about Mrs. Obama on the White House lawn, right, a place where she represented our country with grace, right, like you say, regardless of politics, the way that those two humans conducted themselves while they were representing our country was something that we could be proud of, at least in my opinion. When he says that, Dana, is there a way that Daniel or Joe or Jon can be like, ‘Hey, look, that doesn’t represent what we all feel,’ or even you afterwards? Is there a way that you guys can come out and say, that’s his freedom of speech? That’s something that us at the, as the UFC, we totally disagree with?”
White answered by saying the event had been built around America’s 250th birthday and was meant for every American, not one side of the political map.
“Well, if you look leading into that show, you know, everybody was talking about, you know, you got the people that are always going to say, ‘Oh, this is a political, you know, this is a MAGA party. This is, you know, the president’s throwing his own birthday party and all this bullshit.’ It’s the 250th birthday of America.”
“And to have the opportunity to be able to celebrate that at the White House the way we did, and I said leading up to that fight, if you’re far left, if you’re far right, if you’re right down the middle, this show is for everybody that is an American. We’re going to talk about the history of America and it’s at the White House.”
White said Obama’s public status did not make the line acceptable to him.
“Obviously, Barack and Michelle Obama are public figures. And when you’re a public figure, I mean, you guys know, I’m sure you guys deal with your own level of [expletive] and people talking. It’s just part of the gig. But what I don’t like, first of all, former first lady of the United States, number one. Number two, a wife, a mother. It’s fucking gross.”
“Inappropriate, the timing of it and everything. I think that people understand, there’s people that you can’t talk to and you can’t change their mind and you can’t whatever. Obviously, not the opinion of the UFC and not my opinion or anybody else that fought on that card.”
“It was a really unfortunate thing to happen that night. When you hit this fucking grand slam home run and have a perfect event in every way that it could be, you got a fucking moronic, you know, it just… But other than that, it was a great fucking night. What are you going to do?”
White Says He Heard The Remark Later
The segment ended with Clark calling Hokit’s line a false lie that cut across left and right politics. White agreed that even people on the right would not universally defend it.
“Left and right can both look at that. You can’t tell me that everybody on the right went, ‘Yeah, she’s a man.’ Fucking people were like, ‘What an idiot.'”
White also said he did not catch the comment live during the event.
“I could go fucking mental on this show right now, but I won’t. It was gross. It was just, you know. And I didn’t even know it. I didn’t hear it until after the event. I didn’t know he had said it. Like right when he said it there, I didn’t know he had said it.”
