{
  "$type": "site.standard.document",
  "bskyPostRef": {
    "cid": "bafyreibuyr2qeiannsbl7hkgmygsqeaga5jxbsduzj2txyyrrkh3rsq2je",
    "uri": "at://did:plc:qefo6jhzy4lvocnzakfk7rbi/app.bsky.feed.post/3mlmeb6tbfaq2"
  },
  "coverImage": {
    "$type": "blob",
    "ref": {
      "$link": "bafkreigrxrspofnodd4uvkbyuqwdrvpna3c3azitlbuiun2hn53ovo7tl4"
    },
    "mimeType": "image/jpeg",
    "size": 148963
  },
  "path": "/post/210267/trump-white-house-ufc-cage-cash-grab",
  "publishedAt": "2026-05-11T21:34:02.000Z",
  "site": "https://newrepublic.com",
  "tags": [
    "Breaking News",
    "Politics",
    "Republicans",
    "Donald Trump",
    "Republican Party",
    "UFC",
    "White House",
    "Corruption",
    "reports",
    "BBC Sport",
    "200 tickets"
  ],
  "textContent": "Tickets to President Trump’s planned UFC fight on the White House lawn are going to cost a hefty amount.\n\nNBC News reports that even though the UFC is paying for the event, and that tickets are technically free, sponsorship packages including ringside seats are going for $1 million-plus, with BBC Sport putting them as high as $1.5 million. Neither the White House nor the UFC have said where the sponsorship money is going.\n\nTrump is personally selecting most of the 4,000-plus spectators for the event to be held on June 14, which happens to be his 80th birthday.\n\n“I’m going to make a lot of enemies because it’s impossible to get everyone tickets,” Trump told NBC Friday in a telephone interview.\n\nTrump will likely reward people who have given him political or business favors in the past, or those who are willing to pay up to attend. White House communications director Steven Cheung told NBC that Trump was splitting up his tickets among administration staffers, military servicemembers, and VIPs. The last group could include anyone Trump wants, including members of Congress and foreign dignitaries.\n\n“I get calls, texts or emails every day — a few times every day,” Cheung, a former UFC spokesperson, said of the ticket requests he and other White House staffers are getting. UFC’s own president and CEO Dana White said last month that he only had taken about 200 tickets for himself and gave the rest to Trump, while TKO controls another 200.\n\nAn unnamed Trump adviser told NBC that the event is “his show, and it’s being treated that way.”\n\n“The process has been absolute chaos,” the adviser said. “It’s hard to overstate how many requests have come in, but there is no doubt the people President Trump wants there will be there, and those he does not will not be.”\n\nThe president and CEO of UFC parent company TKO Holdings, Mark Shapiro, said in an earnings call earlier this month that the company expected to lose as much as $30 million on the event.\n\nKnowing Trump, he’s going to take whatever money he can from the fight, and Republicans in Congress will work to ensure that there is no transparency (possibly in exchange for tickets). The spectacle will essentially be a circus trading off of the presidency, with Trump as a monarch watching people fight for his amusement in the octagon or to get a seat by his side.",
  "title": "Trump Turns White House UFC Cage Match Into Massive Cash Grab"
}