2026-06-05T09:00:08.389Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/05/politics/ufc-white-house-dana-white-trump
终极格斗冠军赛（UFC）总裁达纳·怀特坚称，不要将白宫草坪上拔地而起的大型综合格斗竞技场误认为是政治表态。他在接受CNN采访时表示，这不过是美国建国250周年庆祝活动的一部分。
这一区分对怀特而言至关重要。尽管多年来一直是总统唐纳德·特朗普最知名的盟友之一——曾在最近三届共和党全国代表大会上发表演讲，帮助共和党在对特朗普重返白宫至关重要的年轻男性选民群体中打开局面——但怀特多次宣称自己已告别政坛。
如今，其中不少选民似乎和怀特一样急于远离政治。
随着6月14日——美国国旗日暨特朗普80岁生日——白宫南草坪上的多场UFC赛事筹备工作进入最后阶段，多项民调显示，特朗普在最有可能观看这场赛事的人群——年轻男性——中的支持率正大幅下滑。根据哈佛大学肯尼迪学院政治研究所最新的年轻人调查，29岁以下男性中仅有约四分之一认可特朗普的工作表现，远低于所有成年人的全国平均水平；其中仅15%的人认为国家发展方向正确。
这种支持率滑坡让共和党人正想方设法维系一个18个月前似乎预示着更广泛政治重组的执政联盟。一些曾助力放大特朗普吸引力的“男性圈子”人士如今已公开批评他。与此同时，另一个表明其文化影响力下滑的迹象是，原计划参与特朗普“自由250”系列音乐会的多数音乐人已退出，这不仅威胁到庆祝活动的举办，还为这场更大范围的庆祝活动增添了更多争议。
但怀特始终坚定支持这位多年老友。在特朗普在UFC核心受众中的支持率不断下滑之际，他精心策划了本月的这场赛事，以最大限度地吸引观众。赛事将有8名美国拳手参战，同时举办两场重量级冠军争夺战。比赛将在一座白宫场地前所未有的巨型爪形建筑下举行，约8.5万名观众将在椭圆广场观赛，赛前还将有扎克·布朗乐队的演唱会。
“我不在乎你是极端左翼、极端右翼，还是中间派，”怀特在拉斯维加斯UFC训练中心接受CNN记者萨拉·西德纳的深度采访时表示，这场采访是一部探讨UFC总裁与特朗普总统长达数十年合作关系的纪录片的一部分，“只要你是美国人，就会喜欢这场比赛。”
该纪录片将于美国东部时间6月7日周日晚8点在CNN的《安德森·库珀全程报道》栏目播出，并于6月8日周一在CNN全平台上线。
https://www.cnn.com/
“所有人都劝我别这么做”
对特朗普和怀特而言，6月14日的这场赛事标志着一段长达25年的合作关系达到顶峰。一切始于怀特首次收购UFC之时，当时特朗普同意在他的大西洋城赌场之一为这个鲜为人知的综合格斗联盟举办赛事。
“他很早就看懂了这项运动，”怀特说，“后来我们不断发展壮大，每当业务和我职业生涯中出现重大进展时，他都会联系我说：‘太棒了。我就知道你们会做到这一步。’”
这段友谊在2016年踏入政坛，当时特朗普邀请怀特在共和党全国代表大会上发表演讲。彼时，许多共和党人都与这位从真人秀明星转型而来的共和党总统候选人划清界限，怀特表示，顾问们都警告他不要接受邀请。
“几乎所有人都劝我别这么做，”他告诉CNN，“别做这事，别卷入政坛。”
但怀特表示，他觉得有必要支持一个在批评者——包括后来成为特朗普对手的已故参议员约翰·麦凯恩——将这项暴力运动斥为“人类斗鸡”时，曾给UFC机会的人。
怀特在特朗普第一任期及2020年选举后的混乱 aftermath 期间始终追随特朗普。在特朗普从棕榈滩的“流亡”状态中谋划卷土重来时，怀特鼓励他重新考虑媒体策略，争取传统保守派媒体之外的受众。
“我当时觉得，如果总统继续只在福克斯新闻露面，他赢不了，”怀特说，“但我知道，他可以坐下来做一档三小时的播客，让很多人觉得他亲切接地气。”
据负责特朗普竞选数字战略的顾问亚历克斯·布鲁塞维茨透露，在特朗普正式宣布再次参选之前，怀特就将他介绍给了Nelk Boys——一群拥有日益增长的在线粉丝群的加拿大恶作剧者。YouTube后来因选举虚假信息指控删除了他们与特朗普的采访视频，但布鲁塞维茨表示，这场争议反而扩大了Nelk Boys的影响力，同时提升了特朗普在迎合反建制和非主流观点的在线生态系统中的可信度。
怀特还给特朗普的顾问们列出了其他数字达人的名单，这些人的受众可能会觉得这位前总统颇具吸引力。在接下来的两年里，特朗普沉浸在播客、喜剧演员、流媒体主播和在线人物的数字世界中，这些人对疏离的年轻男性群体的影响力与日俱增。
“他给我介绍了很多我从未听说过的年轻人，”特朗普最近在接受《时代》周刊采访时表示，“我的意思是，我当时在接受20岁左右的年轻人的采访。我会说：‘你到底是从哪儿认识这些人的？’他们叫网红。但我确实做了很多。我和其中一些人成了朋友。他们都是好孩子，粉丝众多，一切都有帮助。”
这一策略助长了一种政治秩序正在改变的看法。如果说千禧一代在特朗普第一任期内定义了对他的抵抗，那么戴着“让美国再次伟大”（MAGA）帽子的Z世代男性则成为他政治卷土重来的标志性形象。
“我22岁的时候，甚至都不知道州长是谁，”怀特说，“现在这些22岁的年轻人对政治狂热得很。”
选举结果也印证了这一点：在2020年以两位数差距输掉30岁以下男性选民支持后，特朗普在2024年赢得了这一群体的支持。
但年轻男性很快就开始远离特朗普。
在他重返白宫的第一年中期，民调显示年轻选民的不满情绪日益高涨：他们为高昂的生活成本、日益难以负担的住房市场、特朗普的外交政策决策以及人工智能如何重塑他们的就业前景而苦恼。
哈佛大学肯尼迪学院政治研究所民调主任约翰·德拉·沃尔佩表示，年轻男性正变得越来越不意识形态化，越来越受自身生活经历的驱动——这种动态最初帮助了特朗普，但如今正导致他们对特朗普失去幻想。
“他们做决定的依据是自己的生活是否稳定、充满希望、负担得起，且在自己的掌控之中，”沃尔佩说，他已负责哈佛青年民调超过25年，“这就是为什么2024年有相当多的人转向支持共和党，也是他们在今年夏季中期选举前思考问题的视角。”
最新的哈佛青年民调显示，一半的年轻男性不确定是否会在11月的选举中投票，约四分之一的人对政治体系持总体怀疑态度。仅有10%的人自认为是MAGA支持者，仅27%的人希望共和党控制国会。
在这种背景下，特朗普正面临一些在2024年竞选期间帮助他接触新受众的人士的越来越多的批评。
乔·罗根——这位与怀特关系密切的播客主持人、UFC解说员，在2024年大选的最后时刻 endors 了特朗普——最近表示，与伊朗的冲突让特朗普的支持者感到“被背叛”。喜剧演员安德鲁·舒尔茨和西奥·冯都曾在大选期间在自己的网络节目中邀请特朗普做客，如今也越来越多地批评本届政府。
一名资深白宫顾问承认，在年轻男性群体中维持支持率面临挑战，但淡化了这些人物对塑造本次选举叙事的影响。
“还有其他方式可以接触这些受众，我们会做到的，”这位顾问说，“我们会不择手段地组建执政联盟。”
https://www.cnn.com/
从短期来看，这一努力包括即将到来的UFC赛事。赛事筹备工作在特朗普2024年胜选庆祝活动后几天就启动了，当时怀特还发表了胜利演讲。特朗普与怀特密切参与了筹备工作，怀特本周还到访了白宫。
根据益普索（Ipsos）提供给CNN的去年秋季发布的一项关于这项快速发展运动的调查，约四分之一的35岁以下男性认为自己是综合格斗爱好者。在线体育博彩公司BetMGM今年早些时候发布的收视数据显示，最有可能定期观看UFC赛事的年龄段是25至35岁，其中90%的观众为男性。
特朗普一直在积极宣传这场赛事，他在白宫接待了拳手，并在社交媒体上发布竞技场建设的最新进展。但这场赛事也招致了批评，包括罗根，他计划出席，但也提出了安全担忧，并称这场比赛“有点像噱头”。
沃尔佩表示，如果年轻选民继续感到经济和情感上的不安，重现2024年的政治和文化活力可能会很困难。
“文化活动能起到作用，但现实生活体验更重要，”他说。
即便如此，白宫官员仍乐观地认为，年轻男性不会倒向民主党——民主党在这一群体中的支持率仍处于极低水平。
资深民主党数字战略家罗布·弗莱厄蒂表示，他所在的政党未能抓住这一机会。例如，最近发布的民主党全国委员会复盘报告仅提及了一次年轻男性，而“播客”和“罗根”均未被提及。
弗莱厄蒂表示，民主党可以围绕人工智能打造一个民粹主义信息，激励那些对未来感到恐惧的年轻人，但他认为“民主党胆小怕事，害怕硅谷的资金，错失了一代人以来建立一个更公平、更公正社会的最大机遇”。
与此同时，怀特认为，许多年轻男性仍觉得民主党疏远了他们——并将UFC视为一种文化出口和政治信号。他也渴望将这项运动带到一个历史性的舞台上。
“我们玩得很开心，打破纪录，献上精彩的比赛，”怀特说，“这就是我们的本职。”
CNN的阿里尔·爱德华兹-莱维对本文亦有贡献。
Young men are leaving Trump. Can a UFC fight at the White House get them back in the ring?
2026-06-05T09:00:08.389Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/05/politics/ufc-white-house-dana-white-trump
Do not mistake the massive mixed martial arts arena rising out of the White House lawn for a political statement, insists Ultimate Fighting Championship President Dana White. It is, he told CNN, simply part of the celebration for America’s 250th birthday.
That distinction matters to White, who has repeatedly declared himself finished with politics despite spending years as one of President Donald Trump’s most visible allies — speaking at the last three Republican National Conventions and helping the GOP make inroads with the young male voters key to Trump’s return to the White House.
Many of those same voters appear just as eager as White to leave politics behind.
As final preparations are made for a slate of UFC fights on the White House South Lawn on June 14 – Flag Day and Trump’s 80th birthday – polls show Trump’s support is collapsing among the Americans most likely to watch the event: young men. About one-in-four men under the age of 29 approve of Trump’s job performance, well below the national average of all adults, according to the Institute of Politics at Harvard Kennedy School’s most recent survey of young adults, and just 15% of them think the country is headed in the right direction.
The erosion has left Republicans searching for ways to hold together a coalition that 18 months ago appeared to signal a broader political realignment. Some of the figures in the so-called manosphere who helped amplify Trump’s appeal are now openly criticizing him. Meanwhile, in another sign of his slipping cultural cache, most of the musical acts scheduled to participate in Trump’s Freedom 250 concert series have dropped out, threatening the festivities and injecting more controversy into the broader celebration.
White, however, has remained steadfast in support of his longtime friend. And he has designed this month’s event for maximum appeal at a time when Trump’s standing is deteriorating with UFC’s core audience. It features eight American fighters and two major title bouts. It will take place under a towering claw unlike anything constructed on the White House grounds, with about 85,000 people watching from the Ellipse, and it will be proceeded by a Zac Brown Band concert.
“I don’t care if you’re the furthest crazy left, or the furthest crazy right, or right down the middle,” White said in a wide-ranging interview with CNN’s Sara Sidner at the Las Vegas UFC Performance Institute, part of a documentary exploring the decadeslong partnership between the UFC president and President Trump. “If you are an American, you will enjoy this show.”
The documentary airs Sunday, June 7 at 8 p.m. ET on CNN’s “The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper.” It will be available on CNN All Access on Monday, June 8.
https://www.cnn.com/
‘Everybody told me not to do it’
For Trump and White, the June 14 event marks the culmination of a partnership that has spanned a quarter century, beginning when White first acquired UFC and Trump agreed to host fights for the little-known mixed-martial arts league at one of his Atlantic City casinos.
“He got it early,” White said, “and then as we continued to grow, every time something big would happen, to the business and in my career, he would reach out and say, ‘That’s incredible. I always knew you guys were going to do this.’”
The friendship entered the political arena in 2016, when Trump asked White to speak at the Republican National Convention. At the time, many Republicans were distancing themselves from the reality star-turned-GOP nominee, and White said advisers warned him against accepting the invitation.
“Literally everybody told me not to do it,” he told CNN. “Don’t do it, don’t get into politics.”
But White said he felt compelled to stand by someone who had given UFC a chance when critics — including the late Sen. John McCain, who would also become a Trump antagonist — had derided the violent sport as a form of human cockfighting.
White remained in Trump’s orbit through his first term and the chaotic aftermath of the 2020 election. And as Trump plotted a political comeback from exile in Palm Beach, White encouraged him to rethink his media strategy and seek out audiences beyond traditional conservative outlets.
“I felt like that if the president stayed on Fox he wasn’t going to win,” White said. “What I do know is he can sit on a three-hour podcast and be relatable to a lot of people.”
Before Trump had formally launched another campaign, White introduced him to the Nelk Boys, a group of Canadian pranksters with a growing online following, according to Alex Bruesewitz, the Trump adviser who oversaw the campaign’s digital strategy. YouTube later removed their interview with Trump over election misinformation claims, but Bruesewitz said the controversy only expanded the Nelk Boys’ reach while boosting Trump credibility within an online ecosystem that catered to anti-establishment and non-conformist views.
White gave Trump advisers a list of other digital mavens whose audience might find the former president compelling. Over the next two years, Trump immersed himself in the digital world of podcasters, comedians, streamers and online figures increasingly influential with disengaged young men.
“He introduced me to people I never heard of, young kids,” Trump recently told TIME. “I mean, I was being interviewed by 20-year-old kids. I’m saying, ‘Where the hell did you meet these people?’ They’re called influencers. But I did a lot. I became friendly with some of them. They’re nice kids, and they do have a big audience, and everything helps.”
The strategy fueled the perception of a changing political order. If millennials helped define the resistance to Trump during his first term, Gen Z men in MAGA hats became an enduring image of his political comeback.
“When I was 22, I couldn’t even tell you who the governor was,” White said. “Now these 22-year-olds are crazy political.”
The results were evident at the polls: Four years after losing men under 30 by double digits, Trump carried the demographic in 2024.
It didn’t take long for young men to begin slipping away from Trump.
By the middle of his first year back in office, polls showed growing frustration among young voters struggling with high living costs, an increasingly inaccessible housing market, Trump’s foreign policy decisions and how artificial intelligence was reshaping their job prospects.
John Della Volpe, director of polling at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics, said young men are becoming less ideological and more driven by their lived experiences — a dynamic that initially helped Trump but is now contributing to their disenchantment with him.
“They’re making decisions on whether their life feels stable, hopeful, affordable and in their control,” said Volpe, who has overseen the Harvard Youth Poll for more than 25 years. “That was the prism of why a significant number shifted to Republican support in 2024 and that’s the lens they’re carrying into the summer as we head toward midterms.”
The latest Harvard Youth Poll found that half of young men aren’t certain if they’ll vote in November, while roughly a quarter expressed overall cynicism with the political system. Just 10% identified themselves as MAGA and only 27% want to see Republicans control Congress.
Against this backdrop, Trump is facing mounting criticism from some of the figures who helped introduce him to new audiences during the 2024 campaign.
Joe Rogan, the podcaster and UFC commentator close to White who endorsed Trump in the final moments of the 2024 election, recently said the war with Iran has left Trump supporters feeling “betrayed.” Comedians Andrew Schulz and Theo Von, both of whom hosted Trump on their web shows during the election, have also increasingly criticized the administration.
A senior White House adviser acknowledged the challenge of maintaining support among younger men but downplayed the impact these figures will have in shaping the narrative of this election.
“There’s other ways to reach those audiences, and we will,” the adviser said, “And we will cobble a coalition together by hook or by crook.”
https://www.cnn.com/
In the near term, that effort includes the upcoming UFC fight. Planning for the fight card started just days after Trump’s 2024 victory celebration, which included a triumphant victory speech from White. Trump has been closely involved in the planning with White, who visited the White House this week.
About one-in-four men under 35 consider themselves fans of mixed-martial arts, according to a survey about the fast-growing sport released last fall provided to CNN by Ipsos. Viewership data published earlier this year by the online sportsbook BetMGM found the age group most likely to regularly watch UFC fights is 25- to 35-year-olds, and 90% of viewers are males.
Trump has regularly promoted the event, hosting fighters at the White House and posting updates on the arena construction to social media. But it has also drawn critics, including Rogan, who plans to attend but has raised security concerns and called the fights “kind of a gimmick.”
Volpe said recreating the political and cultural energy of 2024 may prove difficult if young voters continue to feel financially and emotionally unsettled.
“The cultural part works, but it’s trumped by the experience,” he said.
Even so, White House officials remain optimistic that young men will not drift toward Democrats, whose approval rating among the demographic remains deeply under water.
Rob Flaherty, a veteran Democratic digital strategist, said his party was failing to capitalize on the opening. The recently released Democratic National Committee autopsy, for example, referenced young men just once, while “podcast” and “Rogan” went unmentioned.
Flaherty said Democrats could build a populist message around AI that can animate young people scared about their futures, but argued “the Democratic Party is chickensh*t and scared of Silicon Valley money and is missing out on the biggest opportunity in a generation to build a more fair and just society.”
White, meanwhile, believes many young men still feel alienated by Democrats — and sees UFC as both a cultural outlet and political signal. And he’s eager to bring his sport to a historic stage.
“We have a blast, we break records, and we put on great fights,” White said. “That’s what we do.”
CNN’s Ariel Edwards-Levy contributed to this report.
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