For most of its 250-year history, the White House South Lawn has been reserved for state dinners, diplomatic ceremonies, Easter egg rolls, turkey pardons and carefully choreographed displays of presidential power.
On Sunday night it hosted cage fights.
Beneath a giant steel canopy known as the Claw, with military flyovers overhead and thousands of spectators spread across the South Lawn and nearby Ellipse, Donald Trump celebrated his 80th birthday and the forthcoming 250th anniversary of US independence by staging the first professional sporting event in White House history.
The night also defied one of the day’s biggest concerns. Forecasts had warned that thunderstorms could disrupt the outdoor event, prompting organizers to delay the start by an hour. But not a single drop of rain fell on the grounds.
The spectacle ended shortly after 1am on Monday with one of the bigger upsets in UFC history as Justin Gaethje rallied from several perilous moments to stop the previously unbeaten Ilia Topuria after four brutal rounds and claim the undisputed lightweight championship.
“I’m from America,” Gaethje said afterwards. “Two hundred and fifty years ago, we were way bigger than six-to-one underdogs, and look at this country now.”
It was a fitting conclusion to an evening that often felt less like a sporting event than a demonstration of American power.
Trump and UFC chief executive Dana White emerged from the White House at dusk to a military color guard and a rare combined flyover by the Blue Angels and Thunderbirds. Later, a B-1 bomber thundered over the South Lawn. A recruitment advertisement from the newly renamed Department of War aired during the broadcast. Chants of “U-S-A! U-S-A!” echoed throughout the purpose-built grandstands all night.
The guest list reflected the unusual collision of politics, technology and combat sports. Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg watched from seats not far from the Winklevoss twins, while cabinet officials, foreign dignitaries and political allies drifted through the ringside area throughout the evening.
Yet if the event was intended as a celebration of American strength and exceptionalism, it also repeatedly descended into something cruder. The most striking example came after prospect Josh Hokit stopped Derrick Lewis in the second round of their heavyweight bout. After exiting the cage to present Trump with a necklace at ringside, Hokit delivered a rambling post-fight interview that veered from praise for the president to religion before concluding with the false conspiracy claim that “Michelle Obama is a man.”
The remark, one of the oldest and most persistent smears directed at the former first lady, drew cheers from some sections of the crowd and bewilderment from others. Even on a night that had already blurred the line between civic ceremony, political rally and pay-per-view entertainment, Hokit still found a way to lower the level of discourse.
Hokit’s comments were not the evening’s only political barb. When former UFC bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley faced Canada’s Aiemann Zahabi, the bout took on a nationalistic fervor. Trump donned a white “USA” hat cageside while chants of “U-S-A!” rang out from sections of the crowd. At various points spectators shouted “Canada is the 51st state!” – echoing Trump’s repeated taunts about annexing America’s northern neighbor – while others urged O’Malley to “eat” his opponent.
The crowd erupted when O’Malley finished Zahabi by second-round TKO, celebrating the first victory by an American fighter over a foreign-born opponent on the card. Before leaving the cage, O’Malley thanked the fans gathered on the Ellipse and paid tribute to White.
“Dana’s a fucking gangster,” he said.
The fights themselves rarely lacked entertainment. Every bout on the seven-fight card ended by knockout or technical knockout, the first time that has happened in the UFC’s 33-year history. Ciryl Gane stopped Alex Pereira to claim the interim heavyweight title, while Hokit, O’Malley and Bo Nickal all delivered emphatic victories in front of the president. But the night belonged to Gaethje.
The 37-year-old American entered as a heavy underdog against Topuria, the unbeaten Georgian-Spanish champion who many regard as the sport’s top pound-for-pound fighter. Topuria appeared in control early and repeatedly hurt Gaethje with body shots and combinations. The second round ended with Topuria pinning Gaethje against the cage directly in front of Trump, appearing firmly in control. Yet the American weathered the storm.
By the third round, Topuria’s face was swollen and bloodied. By the fourth, the champion was struggling to see. After a ringside doctor examined him between rounds, Topuria’s corner ultimately stopped the fight before the fifth.
“That guy had me in trouble,” Gaethje said. “He had me rocked. He smoked my liver. But I stuck in it.”
The victory completed a career-long pursuit of the undisputed lightweight championship and provided the home crowd with an American winner in the main event.
As fireworks exploded above the White House to John Philip Sousa’s Stars and Stripes Forever past 1am on Monday morning, Trump entered the cage to congratulate Gaethje and greet his mother. The evening ended as it had begun: with a display of patriotic pageantry on a scale rarely seen in American sports.