Ultimate Fighting Championship head Dana White had few answers
for his actions a couple years ago.
At a New Year’s Eve celebration in Mexico at the end of 2022, White
was
filmed slapping his wife in the midst of a physical
altercation. As seen in the video, he appeared to grab wife, Anne,
by the wrist, and she struck him in the face. He responded by
slapping her back, before others intervened. White received no
public punishment from his organization, and no charges were
filed.
White and his wife both explained later that alcohol played a
factor into tensions escalating between them, resulting in them
slapping one another. After regularly declaring that “there is
never an excuse for a man to put his hands on a woman,” he did so
and did not receive any notable consequences. White suggested that
the stigma of him doing so was his punishment, that he would always
been known as a man who struck his wife.
Rules for thee, not for me
Appearing on a recent episode of “The Breakfast
Club” hosted by Charlamagne tha God, Jess Hilarious, DJ Envy
and Loren LoRosa, White was asked numerous challenging questions
ranging from the operation of the UFC to his incident with his
wife. Putting White on the spot, Charlamagne asked the UFC
president what would happen if a fighter was filmed striking their
partner in a public setting.
“It’s happened, don’t you [know],” White retorted. “You know what’s
funny is that…it’s not funny but, I used to say that you don’t
recover from those [offenses]. Those are the ones you don’t recover
from.”
Charlamagne replied, “But you did.” White’s response? “I did.”
White tried to push back that being in charge of the company
protected him from any recompence, but the hosts were not having
it. Jess Hilarious pointed out that he specifically, publicly
announced that he would not be stepping away from the UFC after
this occurred.
“There’s a board of directors, there’s other people that are
involved [in the decision-making process] that could have pushed
for [his removal], but I think, and obviously they think too, it
would have hurt the company more if I did step away,” White
expressed.
When challenged that he had disciplined fighters in the past for
their comments or conduct, he claimed he was far less harsh than
another sports leagues would be to those who violated code of
conduct policies. Of note, Miguel
Torres was
briefly released for making a reference to a crude joke in the
television show “Workaholics,” Matt
Mitrione was suspended
for his statements about transgender fighter Fallon Fox
and Nate
Diaz was also
suspended for his words on Twitter in the past.
“I’m probably the most lenient guy in sports when it comes to
dealing with…free speech or bad things that happen. I’m in the
fight business, it’s not like I run Microsoft,” he replied.
The interview took a turn when Charlamagne asked White what
standard he held himself to when handling this debacle. An
uncomfortable White shifted in his chair and adjusted his suit
jacket while stumbling over his words for an answer.
“Listen, obviously, that’s not…that’s not what…it was…yeah, I mean
this is as bad as it could get. I mean, I hold myself to…I would
never in a million years think that that was going to happen,” he
offered.
White gathered himself and continued, “I say this all the time,
nobody knows you better than your kids do. And, whoever you really
are, your kids see it. They hear everything that goes on at home,
and…my oldest son didn’t talk to us for like four days. He was in
college, so [age] 19 probably, 19-20. The first thing that [my
wife] and I did was handle the situation with the kids. And then,
obviously, I had to handle the business side of the whole thing. We
handled the kids first.”
Dana White is asked about the altercation
with his wife and if being the boss protected him from
consequences.pic.twitter.com/uWBDzbanYN— Jed I. Goodman © (@jedigoodman)
May 8, 2026