US State Department becomes official UFC promoter
Marco Rubio is another Ari Emanuel asset for the 2028 US Presidential election.
Thursday’s press conference at the State Department with UFC mastermind Lawrence Epstein, brand ambassador Dana White, and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio was the perfect encapsulation of the marriage between TKO and the State.
Enjoy your combat sports being controlled by sovereign wealth funds, Wall Street, and world leaders?
This was exactly the premise behind Scott Barrett’s TKO bull thesis. A state-sponsored multi-monopoly that is in the early innings of growth.
It’s a Big Club and you’re not in it. You are no longer the primary customer. This has been our calling card at The MMA Draw since we first launched this Substack in 2023.
Zach Arnold was right. My fragile ego required me to state that declaration. Lots of people are trying to take credit for knowing what Ari Emanuel’s game all along was while also not stating his name. Lots of people in chattering classes are trying to self-aggrandize their prognostication skills while twisting themselves into knots.
Our readership knows the truth.
Paid subscribers to The MMA Draw have been years ahead of the curve in understanding what Ari Emanuel and Mark Shapiro wanted to accomplish with Endeavor (and now TKO). Ari’s vision of UFC was vastly different than the vision of Frank & Lorenzo Fertitta. Ari saw the value of UFC & WWE as a political mercenary and government contractor. That was always the process play.
Ari Emanuel understood a key business principle under the Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0 White Houses: if you have a concentration of wealth, then the government will act as a multiplier on your behalf. Millions become billions.
This is exactly the scenario we warned about when we asked how Ari Emanuel would benefit from dumping President Joe Biden in favor of President Donald Trump in the 2024 election cycle.
Ari Emanuel and Mark Shapiro are living the good life court side at MSG for the New York Knicks in the NBA Finals. They just bought a piece of the Las Vegas Raiders. Your money — and mine — is helping to finance their life of luxury.
A government contractor and political mercenary
Frequent readers of The MMA Draw have read many variations of articles over the last four years based on this theme. We were often accused to playing “one note.”
The point being, we pushed this line of analysis because it was entirely accurate.
The marriage of combat sports with the State. The marriage of Wall Street, Sovereign Wealth Funds, and world governments.
The Trump FCC approving the Paramount/Skydance merger thanks in part to Ari Emanuel’s negotiating efforts.
The impending marriage of Paramount and Warner Brothers Discovery thanks to massive Sovereign Wealth Fund financing.
On every single side of the deal, Ari Emanuel constantly benefits from conflicts of interest. How does he get away with it? Ari gets away with it because even when he’s seen on camera, no one can come to an agreement on what reality is. Even people who know of him or acknowledge his existence can’t agree on what he does or how he makes his money, so it creates a perfect bubble for The King of Hollywood to operate in.
But there’s a much larger principle at stake.
As you read the breathless coverage this week about Trump and Dana or Trump and the UFC, understand that these two individuals are largely character actors in a much larger scheme.
The real power players are Egon Durban (of Silver Lake), Khaldoon Al Mubarak (of Mubadala), and Ari Emanuel (the TKO ringleader). Within the UFC universe, (Ike) Lawrence Epstein is the real brains behind that office. Ike’s rise in public profile is not a coincidence. He’s one of the few holdovers from the Fertitta Era who transitioned beautifully into Endeavor’s world.
Which made Lawrence Epstein’s appearance at the State Department hearing to announce their Memorandum of Understanding with UFC all the more remarkable.
If you understand the Top 10 TKO power players in 2026, you will know more than 99.99% of the people on this planet who is really running the show.
We will get to what was said in Thursday’s UFC/State Department press conference in a minute. However, there is something much larger at play that must be addressed.
Thursday’s announcement was not just TKO cashing in on a Trump 2.0 White House. It was also Ari Emanuel preparing TKO for Life After Trump.
Ari Emanuel is skillfully positioning politically-controlled assets for the US 2028 Presidential Election campaign. He has assets on both the Democrat and Republican sides. On the Blue Team, Ari has his brother Rahm Emanuel, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, and Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff. On the Republican side, he has Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Secretary Rubio attended multiple UFC events with President Trump and has now reached a MOU between the State Department and UFC. None of this is a coincidence.
Dana White, the Ultimate Diplomat
Thursday’s press conference was shockingly nauseating even by currently low standards in shamelessness. It may as well have been Secretary Rubio’s audition speech for the Ari Emanuel endorsement sweepstakes.
Sarah Rogers, the under secretary of state for public diplomacy, wasted no time in pushing the virtues of UFC’s power as one of America’s biggest and best exports of soft power.
“When you think about it, UFC is tailor made for diplomacy arguably more than any other sport and why is that? Why do people like and respond to sports?
“It’s because sports is a stand-in for combat. It is the most ancient and universal form of contention. Not only does UFC draw on that universal human tradition but it is tailor made for diplomacy because it accommodates and embraces all different international fighting styles. Whether you are a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu artist or a Chinese Kung Fu master or an American boxer, UFC is a sport where you can fight and you can win.
“UFC draws on some essential strands of the American character. In America, we cheer for somebody who can get knocked down and get bet back up again and win the match. Not only that, the Octagon is the ultimate meritocracy. That’s something Americans respond to. It’s something our diplomatic partners around the world respond to.
“People I meet at hotel lobbies and places like that and I ask them, what do you like about America? What American brands, what American figures, what American celebrities are known here? I cannot tell you how often UFC comes up.”
Quick, someone at WME Group hire her for media representation when she leaves the Trump Administration.
Then it came time for our favorite smooth operator, Lawrence Epstein, to make his sales pitch on the value of UFC in American diplomatic affairs.
“UFC is an incredibly global sport and an incredibly global organization. We’re doing 43 events per year and about 17 or 18 of those are in jurisdictions around the world. If you take a look at our roster of fighters, we have fighters from in excess of 75 countries. When you look at our roster of champions, they come from all over the world and so we’re perfectly suited, very excited to be part of this program because we truly are a global sport and a global brand.
“I agree 100% with [Sarah Rogers]. We are a global brand and a global sport but we are American at heart and our cultural values are American. That grit, that get-up after you’ve been knocked down, that refusal to ever lose. And the story of our business, too. We started literally from one person who’s standing over there (Dana White) to where we are today. It’s an incredible entrepreneurial story also.
“So, we’re incredibly proud of what we’ve been able to build from sport from a business standpoint. We are very honored to be part of this program and really look forward to helping the World get closer together.”
When it came time to introduce Dana White, Lawrence Epstein made a hilarious sales pitch that raises more questions than answers.
“This guy is an incredible diplomat. He might not be a professional diplomat like those in this room but he is an incredible and accomplished diplomat. I’ve seen him with heads of state from around the world. I’ve seen him navigate difficult situations in China, Russia, all over the world this guy has been and it’s his personality, it’s his ethos that sort of embodies the entire UFC organization.
“I consider him our chief diplomat.”
Remember when Dana White traveled to Shanghai last year and watched fighting robots? Is Mr. Epstein claiming that Dana White was involved in an unofficial diplomatic mission on behalf of President Trump in August of 2025?
Remember when Russian-American ballerina Ksenia Karelina was involved in a prisoner swap? She reportedly is/was the girlfriend of one of the boxing coaches at Peter Berg’s gym (which used to be called Wild Card West but is now called Matchroom Churchill). Peter Berg and Dana White were credited with having a diplomatic role in Ms. Karelina’s release.
Dana White and Russia is an interesting angle to pursue. It might be something President Trump capitalizes on towards the end of his second White House term.
So, what did our favorite UFC brand ambassador have to say at Thursday’s State Department press conference?
“Obviously, we come from very humble beginnings when we first bought this company 25 years ago. We believed, at that time, that this thing would work everywhere and would work all over the world. I’ve always had this philosophy that, Thank God, it ended up being true. It doesn’t matter what color you are, what country you come from, what language you speak, we’re all human beings and fighting is in our DNA. We get it and we like it.
“I’ve laid in my hotel room in England trying to figure out cricket. Never going to happen. But fighting in any language, as humans we all get it.
“What’s been fascinating in our run over the last 25 years is how we go into these different countries, Presidents of the countries or royal families from these different countries, everybody loves the fights and more importantly if somebody looks like you, talks like you, and comes from where you come from and they’re looked at as the best in the world when it comes to fighting, the entire country rallies around them and it’s a pretty powerful thing.”
Truly the Ultimate Diplomat.
Then came time for Secretary Rubio to give a 10-minute political hard sell about why taxpayers should be funding UFC in the name of American diplomacy.
“Why UFC? I have a couple of reasons why it’s very powerful.
“The first is America and the idea behind America is the impossible. That someone tells you can’t do that. The whole idea of America is audacious. The very idea that you could have a country founded on the principle that your rights come not from your government but from your Creator was an audacious idea. Beyond that, everything we’ve done since then as a nation time and again, how you can achieve some of the things (we have). We are a nation founded on doing what no one else dared to do and no one aspired to do.
“At that some level, that’s what this whole company, what UFC has been. Mixed Martial Arts is not new. It’s been around for 30, maybe 35 years. No rules, no structure. I remember the early fights, I used to watch them back in the day, you could a 170 Brazilian Jiu Jitsu guy fighting a 250 pound heavyweight who was a striker. The rules weren’t clarified. Dana and the people around him had a vision and that was to create a structure around this company. To give it rules, to define it by weight classes, and it attracted some of the best athletes in the world.
“What Dana has built now is a global company that not so long ago seemed impossible.
“Today, you have one of the most recognizable American sports brands on the planet. It reflects so much of the American spirit and is reflected in this American company.
“Here’s the second point. It truly is the United Nations of fighting. If you think about the number of countries that are represented and I think that roster will continue to grow, I think the number of people and champions from around the world (will) continued to be added. I can tell you about our global reach, the number of foreign leaders that want to come to this is unbelievable. It’s the point where we may have a diplomatic crisis. We can’t bring everybody. Some of them don’t even have a fighter in the fight from their country. They want to come because they are fans of the sport and want to follow it.”
You get the picture. The current US Secretary of State and likely 2028 Republican Presidential nominee is pushing the original Zuffa Myth as part of a government platform.
American taxpayer dollars will soon finance the State Department promoting Ari Emanuel’s sporting ventures so he can turn around and finance the real kind of sporting ventures The King of Hollywood wants to get into.
And all of America’s key politicians are on Ari’s side, too. In the name of diplomacy.
Zach Arnold was right. What is our next prediction? US President Donald Trump wants to end his second term with a negotiated agreement to end the Russia/Ukraine conflict. UFC currently has (dormant) financial ties to Kirill Dmitriev, Vladimir Putin’s top financier. What better place to have a peace accord than a UFC event in Moscow near the Kremlin?
I’m sure America’s Ultimate Diplomat can pull this off. In the name of world peace.
Zach Arnold is a lead opinion writer for The MMA Draw on Substack. His archives can be read at FightOpinion.com. Contact Zach: fightopinion at protonmail dot com.