Verdict with Ted Cruz - The Great Dana White One-on-One： Trump, Boxing, Ali vs Tyson, UFC, Business, Exercise & Weight Loss plus the Best Rocky Movie Ever

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.700 Guaranteed human.

00:00:10.040 Welcome.

00:00:10.660 It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you as well.

00:00:14.340 Senator, there are certain shows we get to do with this pod that are just a lot of fun.

00:00:17.940 This is going to be one of those.

00:00:19.920 And we're going to get to cover a lot of different things, including I want to know how you're

00:00:23.980 going to get jacked this year.

00:00:25.680 I'm going to hold you to it in this podcast because you said you wanted to like shred

00:00:29.800 we're using like masculine words today shred 30 pounds is that right that was the january

00:00:34.620 resolution is that i want to get you on the record at the beginning you are absolutely right and i

00:00:40.260 will tell you for all all our listeners and viewers what we have a very special podcast

00:00:44.160 today because we've we've got a guest what we have the great dana white the ceo of ufc an

00:00:51.540 incredible businessman an incredible leader and just an all-around badass uh and and so by the

00:00:58.960 way that is a technical term uh and so dana welcome to verdict we're really glad to have

00:01:04.440 you with us thank you senator thank you ben good to see you man you too so i i'm gonna start with

00:01:09.980 a big question on behalf of the center because i know he's gonna get around this so we're gonna

00:01:13.960 i'm gonna we're holding i am his accountability partner on these new year resolutions one of

00:01:17.980 them is to lose 30 pounds i want to know right away you've gone through a health transformation

00:01:22.700 what is your advice to senator cruz i'll take it as well because you do a lot of very interesting

00:01:28.880 things to get in shape well how old are you senator uh 55 there you go we're the same age so

00:01:34.920 um basically the first thing you do is is start get on a keto diet it's really easy to do especially

00:01:41.980 when you travel um start getting into intermittent fasting which will literally clears all the brain

00:01:48.840 frog you have and and uh gives you more energy believe it or not eating less gives you more

00:01:55.300 energy and then just just get on a modest workout program uh you know when you travel and you stay

00:02:01.880 at hotels i always have a gym what i would what i would advise you to do is find a trainer that

00:02:07.220 you can travel with there's two things i don't go anywhere without my trainer and my cold plunge

00:02:11.940 i have my cold plunge everywhere and how big is your plane i'm just curious asking for a friend

00:02:17.200 well no so what i do is if we go to the ufc it goes on trucks that that that uh get there before

00:02:23.460 we do uh but i have all the hotels dialed in and they figure out a local cold plunge to put inside

00:02:28.400 my hotel room um senator have you ever done a cold plunge have you ever done this i have to admit i'm

00:02:34.940 i'm not a big fan of cold i i like hot but i'm but but i i'm not a big cold so you bring a cold

00:02:41.640 plunge like literally with you yeah so for ufc events we have the cold plunge on the truck

00:02:46.440 but when i travel like i'll be in london all next week i'll have a cold plunge in my room all next

00:02:51.760 week uh and i do it every day it's like for some people who have to get up and have coffee that's

00:02:56.560 like my coffee and the great thing about cold so you do it in the morning typically as soon as you

00:03:01.380 get up it only takes three minutes but when you first start doing it it takes like 33 minutes

00:03:06.200 because you stare at it for 30 minutes and you start telling yourself it would have been over

00:03:10.760 if i just would have done it already but in other words it's a form of torture is what you're telling

00:03:14.680 us they they forced us to do it back in college after training sessions and i've never done it

00:03:19.720 since college center i it's like i hate it i i just want to be very clear i hate the fact data

00:03:24.220 that you like travel with it is insane to me i love it so how cold do you do how cold how cold

00:03:29.540 do you have the water 50 degrees you do three minutes at 50 degrees and and actually it's a

00:03:34.740 form of accomplishment like as soon as you finish that in the morning you've already accomplished

00:03:39.020 something uh that most people will not that day but how it makes you feel the rest of the day is

00:03:45.180 absolutely addicting so what are the benefits what is it what does it do for you it gets rid

00:03:50.520 of the inflammation in your body and at 55 years old doing all the traveling you're doing stress

00:03:55.980 this that and all it gets rid of the inflammation uh and there's nothing better than after you fly

00:04:01.500 somewhere getting into a cold plunge for three minutes it's the best so after you fly it just

00:04:06.380 reset you or what and it gets rid of all the inflammation in your body you know you feel

00:04:10.980 puffy i mean if you take your shoes off on a flight when you land putting your shoes back on

00:04:15.080 Your shoes are tighter.

00:04:16.300 Everything gets rid of all of that right after flying.

00:04:19.440 So you do keto or you're doing mostly meat?

00:04:22.460 You're doing veggies too?

00:04:23.720 Like what do you put in the diet?

00:04:25.520 No.

00:04:25.780 So in keto, what you try to do is you try to limit.

00:04:27.900 The only fruit you can eat are berries, any kind of berry.

00:04:31.940 But, yeah, you eat meat, steaks, chicken.

00:04:35.380 You can eat fish.

00:04:36.540 You know, there's tons of things you can eat.

00:04:37.900 You just can't have any of the sides.

00:04:40.220 You stay away from all the sides.

00:04:41.520 What's an average day of meals for you like a normal day?

00:04:44.620 Not eating out, nice meal at night, like, you know, VIP event type thing.

00:04:48.420 It's 4 o'clock here.

00:04:49.380 I haven't eaten yet.

00:04:50.520 So I eat.

00:04:51.300 I go all day without eating, and then I'll eat dinner.

00:04:53.120 You're intermittent fasting like a whole day.

00:04:55.540 Yeah.

00:04:56.020 I eat dinner at night.

00:04:57.680 So is that your typical intermittent fast is that you just skip breakfast and lunch?

00:05:01.640 Yep, exactly.

00:05:03.200 You know who does that also has the same schedule as Herschel Walker?

00:05:06.960 Yeah, makes sense.

00:05:08.600 And so when I was campaigning in Georgia with Herschel, he just – he doesn't do lunch, doesn't do breakfast.

00:05:13.340 And then, you know, Herschel's in great shape, obviously one of the greatest athletes to ever live.

00:05:18.280 But it's interesting.

00:05:19.200 He does the skip breakfast lunch, too.

00:05:21.480 And here's the thing that's interesting is how it clears your mind and how much sharper you are.

00:05:29.200 Brain fog is gone, and it's pretty amazing.

00:05:32.420 I'm telling you, I've got to figure out.

00:05:34.560 I'm going to try to figure out how to get you dialed in and get some people around you.

00:05:38.220 Once I get you started, you will become addicted to the feeling of it.

00:05:42.880 and and you'll rip the weight off like this all right i'm gonna help you accomplish this this

00:05:47.420 year senator and now you've credited the biologist gary brecca with with helping you on this and

00:05:52.480 actually my mom who's 91 told me this and she she wanted me to ask you like like like what

00:05:58.960 what gary brecca did with it was helpful and what you found uh beneficial the thing is with me on

00:06:04.500 the gary i'm all in on the gary brecca thing so i do the stuff so i used to be on a bunch of pills

00:06:09.080 that doctors were giving me for blood pressure and a bunch of other stuff that I really didn't

00:06:14.460 need to be on for years. So now all I take are supplements. How many and what do you take?

00:06:21.220 So I was on a bunch of different pills every day and I felt horrible, tired, lethargic,

00:06:29.300 and I had real bad sleep apnea, snoring. When you go to the doctor, they tell you to put a CPAP

00:06:34.840 mask on which i could never sleep with it never worked for me uh now i don't have any of that i

00:06:40.600 don't have sleep out and i don't snore anymore and i'm off all meds only on supplements and i

00:06:45.480 couldn't tell you right here the supplements that i'm on but uh i'll first of all what they would

00:06:51.460 do is i'm gonna have i'm gonna reach out to you senator and i'm gonna have them come to a blood

00:06:55.980 test on you yeah and then they'll they'll go through and tell you everything that you need

00:07:01.080 to be on based on your blood work um and then uh and then once you get that and and they give you

00:07:07.960 a plan and and he told me if you can if you give me 12 weeks i'll change your whole life it doesn't

00:07:15.140 take 12 weeks it takes like three after like three weeks you start feeling better and you start feeling

00:07:20.300 and you start to become really addicted to it all right let me ask you an intermittent fasting when

00:07:25.900 You go all day, like, traditionally, if Senator Cruz and I, like, didn't eat today, I'd get that, I would say, call it brain fog.

00:07:33.220 I'd get that kind of the shake thing where I need something.

00:07:36.720 Like, the idea of not eating and then having, like, more focus, is there a transition period there?

00:07:44.380 Because that, to me, seems like I'm going to have a headache.

00:07:46.440 I'm going to feel terrible if I don't eat all day.

00:07:48.980 Yeah, so what you need to do is hydrate.

00:07:50.700 So when you don't eat, you know, I do this thing called the 72-hour water fast.

00:07:55.460 where all you drink are water and electrolytes for 72 hours and um how often do you do that

00:08:02.380 uh you do it like three times a year i do it three times a year what's the advantage of doing that

00:08:09.060 first of all your body starts to eat up all the dead cells cancer cells and and and literally

00:08:17.240 all the things that are really bad for you this thing um that's why you do it two or three times

00:08:23.240 a year your body starts to eat up all the dead and bad cells now i'm not a religious person and i

00:08:29.700 would you know i don't even know if i consider myself spiritual i don't even know how to explain

00:08:33.360 any of that the first time i ever did the 72 hour fast i start when i started to get up around 65

00:08:39.840 hours i was like ah this is what people talk about spiritual you know you start to have this

00:08:46.340 really euphoric weird feeling but you start to get more energy and um just this unbelievable

00:08:53.560 clarity that you get when you fast it really is fascinating and yes so i've i've done 48 hours

00:08:59.740 but i've not done 72 okay and did you drink a lot of water and electrolytes while you were doing it

00:09:04.160 i wasn't doing electrolytes just water so i'm gonna senator when we get done i'm gonna get you

00:09:10.500 i'm gonna get you dialed in all right senator what i want to do you look way too excited right now i

00:09:16.120 I'm going to enjoy this, I think, more than he is.

00:09:18.140 Are we going to get him cold plunging?

00:09:19.580 We're going to get him not eating and electrolyte?

00:09:21.700 This is amazing.

00:09:22.640 And a blood test.

00:09:23.640 Let me know.

00:09:25.220 Ben, let me be clear.

00:09:27.180 The fasting is more likely to happen than the cold plunge.

00:09:30.000 I still have some persuasion on the cold plunge side.

00:09:33.320 Ben, let me be clear.

00:09:34.520 He's going to start out doing, you know, you get him on the road to doing this,

00:09:40.580 and he will get into cold plunging, and he will get into doing the sauna.

00:09:44.800 you become once you go in and you start to feel especially at our age man when you hit 50 i mean

00:09:52.020 it's it's a whole nother ball game when you hit 50 years old people used to tell me that and i

00:09:56.760 used to go ah yeah you know i'll be fine but you really do feel a lot different when you're 50

00:10:02.420 years old and then above he's 55 for your work for your workout or are you lifting are you doing

00:10:08.200 cardio what are you doing for your workout yeah so i don't lift heavy weights anymore i i lift

00:10:13.100 lightweights for rep and and for cardio i walk on the treadmill i mean it's all basic simple stuff

00:10:18.820 nothing crazy you don't have to get into all this crazy working out stuff at 55 years old

00:10:23.060 get in there you know you do a full body workout and uh and do some cardio i gotta ask you a

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00:11:41.000 How much weight did you lose when you were on all the medications and then you clearly made a life change?

00:11:45.580 Like I about two, what was it, Senator, two years ago, I started, I had three boys and I decided I was going to lose weight.

00:11:52.660 I'm down like 80 something pounds and I feel like a different human being.

00:11:56.860 when i started verdict i was at 298 almost and now i'm like i would have two i think 209 somewhere

00:12:02.680 in there that's incredible good for you and i feel different but when you made this switch

00:12:07.540 for me it was i i was like i'm afraid i'm gonna like i don't want to not be around for my kids

00:12:12.660 that was my number one thing and the doctor was very clear he's like hey you're gonna have a stroke

00:12:16.120 or a heart attack you're gonna this is gonna end badly for you you better get your you know what

00:12:20.560 together and if you don't it's gonna be bad like was there something that triggered with you that

00:12:24.460 You're like, all right, I got to get it together.

00:12:25.840 What was the main thing, and how much have you lost?

00:12:28.540 So when I started, I was like 235, 236.

00:12:32.480 I got as low as 191 at one point.

00:12:36.620 But the thing with me was it was more about health.

00:12:39.120 I felt terrible, and I was taking pills, these garbage pills that not only did they not do what I needed them to do,

00:12:46.880 they had tons of side effects, and, you know, like I said, if you've ever had sleep apnea,

00:12:53.320 I mean, and if you snore really bad, it's horrible.

00:12:57.240 It's a horrible experience.

00:12:58.200 I'd wake up every night choking and coughing and throwing up, too.

00:13:02.620 Wow.

00:13:03.220 And, you know, what I found was every time I went to a doctor, nobody could cure anything.

00:13:10.520 It's always take this pill or like I did the sleep study and they put the CPAP mask on your face, right?

00:13:16.480 Yep.

00:13:17.000 And when I talk about Gary Brecka, it's like, you know, people like, oh, that's garbage.

00:13:22.480 it's this is that you know i've seen this guy help so many people so what does he do what does

00:13:27.040 he do that's helpful like what specific so he goes in and does a blood test on you okay a gene

00:13:33.240 test and and he looks at uh this is what i loved about him and this is really where he got just for

00:13:38.640 the record i used to look at this as like you know witch doctor stuff i never believed in any of this

00:13:43.820 stuff and then after covid that now i'm anti-doctor man and there are certain things if i break my arm

00:13:51.460 i'm going to a doctor right if i want to work on my general health definitely not talking to

00:13:57.260 a doctor about that and basically gary goes in finds out what's wrong with you and he told me

00:14:02.380 you shouldn't be on these pills you should have never been on blood pressure he got my sister

00:14:06.660 off blood pressure medicine too um and i had been taking that stuff for like 15 20 years

00:14:11.880 and he gets you on these uh on these different supplements um and uh you know peptides are big

00:14:20.700 right now I'm on some peptides and in three weeks when you do with this guy I got on a keto diet

00:14:27.280 started taking the supplements you know regular exercise in three weeks I felt like a different

00:14:33.100 person and all the people that were around me started to notice the difference in me and I

00:14:37.160 wouldn't be able to run at the level I run at right now if I hadn't met Gary Brecker so this

00:14:43.420 guy completely changed my life all right let's go back that is awesome let's go back and just

00:14:49.300 just tell your story. So you grew up Massachusetts and Nevada. Right. When did you first get

00:14:57.300 interested in boxing and mixed martial arts? And what was it that attracted you to it?

00:15:01.600 Well, it's that thing. It's like when you're a kid, some people, you know, end up being 30 years

00:15:06.660 old and not finding out what it is they want to do for the rest of their life. I was very lucky

00:15:10.820 in the fact that I knew when I was a kid that I wanted to be in the fight business. What that

00:15:15.460 meant at that time i didn't know but i knew that's what i wanted to do so i was 19 years old i lived

00:15:23.180 in boston and i worked at the boston harbor hotel and i was a bellman there i'm like i do not want

00:15:29.520 to do this for the rest of my life i literally walked out the door and quit and there was this

00:15:34.540 guy named peter welsh from south boston who was like a fighting legend and he's a guy you didn't

00:15:40.340 go looking for and i went looking for him and i i found him and i said listen i want to uh i know

00:15:48.020 this sounds crazy but i want to learn everything about the fight game from you i'll work for you

00:15:51.320 for free took me in and this guy was basically my my college professor for the next four years

00:15:57.760 and so you started with boxing before mma right and uh yeah mma so mma didn't even really exist

00:16:05.900 at that time while i was with him you know there was this talk about this fight that was going to

00:16:10.280 happened that was no rules and it could be any style and we watched it on pay-per-view you know

00:16:16.080 and it was shocking and crazy but i never i didn't get into it so uh now like when you were a kid

00:16:22.380 let's say you're in junior high were you a kid that got in a lot of fights i mean was it like a

00:16:26.280 rough upbringing or how what drew you to the world of fighting i wasn't really like that my uncles at

00:16:31.500 the time were really uh into boxing and and you know when the big fights were on abc wild world

00:16:37.860 sports or whatever it would be there was always this energy and buzz in the house that i became

00:16:42.980 you know that i fell in love with yeah and uh and i just became a fight fan you know it's no

00:16:49.660 different than how does a kid become a baseball fan or a fan of football it's just mine was

00:16:54.400 fighting now did you do other sports you play football or basketball baseball nope i was always

00:17:00.000 just into fighting yep okay i mean i played i played the level that your parents put you in

00:17:05.340 Yeah, when you were young.

00:17:07.240 I did play, but I was never into it or anything like that.

00:17:11.460 All right, now I read something online that I thought was fascinating,

00:17:14.760 which is you were in Boston, and you decided to leave Boston

00:17:18.820 because the mobster, Whitey Bulger, threatened you,

00:17:23.560 and that's what took you to Vegas.

00:17:25.280 You've got to tell us that story because that's a wild story.

00:17:28.440 He didn't threaten me.

00:17:29.720 His guys did.

00:17:30.540 His guys wanted money from me, and, you know, that I obviously didn't know them.

00:17:36.920 And, yeah, so I got a call at my house one day, and they're like, you got until tomorrow to pay it.

00:17:42.260 And did you owe him money?

00:17:43.540 Had you borrowed money?

00:17:44.500 Or, like, what put you in that situation?

00:17:46.160 I didn't even know those guys.

00:17:47.520 You know, those aren't guys you want to.

00:17:48.360 So they were just shaking you down.

00:17:50.300 100%.

00:17:50.660 100%.

00:17:51.500 And they had approached me one day at one of the fitness clubs.

00:17:58.420 and you know first thing he said to me is do you know who i am and i didn't know who he was

00:18:03.460 and then as he started talking i figured out who he was um and yeah so they literally uh called me

00:18:09.720 up they said you got till tomorrow to pay us i said i don't know how much was it 1500 2000 2500

00:18:15.720 bucks and that ballpark which was like 25 000 to me back then yes and uh now were they trying to

00:18:22.560 press you to like fix fights i mean was that what was driving them or they just wanted money from

00:18:27.200 you yeah i wasn't involved in any of that stuff at that time we were training fighters but um

00:18:32.320 yeah no so they called me one day and they said you got till tomorrow i said or what

00:18:38.300 said are you gonna find out and i literally hung up the phone called delta and flew to vegas the

00:18:44.500 next day all right did you ever see the movie the departed where jack nicholson plays whitey

00:18:49.260 bulger what'd you think of the as a boston guy what'd you what'd you think of the movie the

00:18:53.520 portrayal well i lived there during that whole era which was yeah i mean crazy the things that

00:18:58.820 i saw and the things that um whatever but i never had any interaction or involvement with those guys

00:19:04.720 that i knew of anyway i you know you just you just heard about him and things like that um but then

00:19:12.560 to come to find out that you know they had this thing back that south boston was crazy at that

00:19:17.200 time like you could shoot somebody i mean guys would get beat up and all this stuff and nobody

00:19:22.160 would call the police you didn't call the police and uh you know come to come to find out later

00:19:29.000 he was involved with you know with the fbi and if you did call he'd know you called having just

00:19:35.620 come back from israel i want to paint you a picture it's midnight sirens are blaring and

00:19:40.780 you have only seconds to grab your child and run now imagine you're elderly your legs don't work

00:19:47.720 like they used to getting downstairs feels impossible and after all of that you end up in

00:19:52.540 a bomb shelter for hours even days because you can't make the trek again this is what's happening

00:19:59.140 across israel as operation epic fury continues children are being traumatized families are just

00:20:05.900 exhausted and homes have been destroyed and that's why the international fellowship of christians and

00:20:11.980 Jews is there on the ground, bringing food, emergency equipment, care for those children

00:20:18.000 and help for the elderly and supplying the bomb shelters and medical centers for critically

00:20:23.860 needed essentials.

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00:20:56.000 That's ifcj.org.

00:20:58.380 Now, you come to Vegas, and you get an opportunity to buy the UFC,

00:21:04.160 and you go to the Fertitta brothers, who I guess you do from school in Vegas.

00:21:08.400 but at the time there wasn't much to the ufc when you were buying it tell us about how that

00:21:13.060 came to pass well at the time i i was representing a couple of guys who fought in the ufc and some

00:21:19.360 that wanted to and i got into a contract uh negotiation with the old owner of the ufc

00:21:24.660 and then finally he flipped out during the call and said you know what there is no more money i

00:21:29.320 don't even know if i have enough money to put on the next event so i was like when we hung up the

00:21:34.500 phone i was like holy shit you know this thing's going out of business so i called the fertita

00:21:40.440 brothers and i said hey i just got off the phone with bob myrwitz the owner i think the ufc's in

00:21:46.360 trouble i think they're going out of business and i think we should buy it so i connected uh

00:21:50.300 lorenzo fertita and bob myrwitz and they started talking and a couple months later we bought the

00:21:54.980 company for two million dollars what's it and then now just to put it in perspective

00:21:59.200 what's it worth it's it's in the billions it's a billion so they're happy with you right they're

00:22:06.940 they're glad you called that day well it all worked out it all worked out now when i call

00:22:12.600 and say i need some money they're like how much you need now when you bought it i mean they had

00:22:18.260 not many assets they they had the name that they had an octagon i i read that they'd actually sold

00:22:24.940 the website UFC to somebody else. So like, how did you, once you buy it, then you're like, okay,

00:22:32.020 I got to build this into something that can generate real revenue and become a, I don't know

00:22:37.500 if you were thinking a global business at the time, but how did you build it from where it was

00:22:42.420 to where it is now? Yeah. So when we bought it, we bought basically those three letters in an old

00:22:47.240 wooden octagon because everything else had been stripped out and sold. You know, the merchandise

00:22:51.920 rights the the video game rights uh the uh even even the you know the dvd business became very

00:22:59.340 big during our early days of the ufc we didn't even own the rights to that and just and senator

00:23:05.300 just to show you how much nobody believed in this thing lionsgate owned the rights to all that stuff

00:23:12.140 and we actually went back and bought the rights from them and you know they were probably laughing

00:23:17.200 at us when we left they're like we just these guys you know they're thinking about how that's

00:23:21.040 going to look on their books over the next two years but it's it's it really is a testament to

00:23:25.520 how nobody believed in this thing and nobody thought it would work that they sold us the

00:23:29.740 rights back what what was the secret to building it back was it just pure sweat equity hard work

00:23:35.360 what did you see in the value when you guys went to buy it and you said hey i think two million is

00:23:40.480 worth it we should do this was it because you knew the fighters or did you understand the product and

00:23:44.880 how to market it what was what was different from what you did compared to what the guys before were

00:23:49.240 doing so the Fertinas and I started taking jujitsu together and that's how we fell in love with the

00:23:55.040 sport we started to meet some of the athletes and you know these athletes were different than

00:24:00.240 boxers a lot of these guys graduated college and you know if you look at Chuck Liddell right with

00:24:05.160 the mohawk and the Chinese writing on he looks like an axe murderer but this guy actually graduated

00:24:10.200 from Cal Poly with honors with an accounting degree you know what I mean okay I didn't I've

00:24:14.980 met chuck i didn't know that that that's very cool yeah so they all had those kind of stories

00:24:20.120 and we were interested in it and said you know what if this was done the right way we put on a

00:24:24.980 better live event plus i had always felt like boxing was messed up and on the decline i thought

00:24:30.460 we felt like this could this could be big and i've always had this philosophy that fighting works

00:24:36.860 everywhere you know what i mean and when you think about the united states we have so many sports

00:24:41.460 here nba college basketball nfl uh college football the list goes on and on and on but

00:24:48.000 in a lot of these other countries they have soccer and that's it yeah so and boxing was huge

00:24:53.100 in latin america as well absolutely and listen i don't care what color you are what country you

00:24:58.920 come from what language you speak we're all human beings and fighting is in our dna we get it we

00:25:03.640 like it yes we love fighting and especially if somebody looks like one of my one of my favorite

00:25:09.020 quotes that I use in politics and life is from Mike Tyson. Everyone has a plan until they get

00:25:13.540 punched in the face. And that's pretty universal. I agree. And when somebody looks like you,

00:25:20.380 comes from where you come from, you know, people rally around them when they're looked at

00:25:24.320 as the best in the world in the fight game. Now, you said that you thought boxing was

00:25:30.340 messed up. How so? What was messed up about boxing? A lot of things were messed up. Well,

00:25:35.440 let's let's go to senator john mccain so senator john mccain um was the one that got the ufc

00:25:41.160 basically shut down and taken off cable and i didn't know that oh yeah oh yeah senator john

00:25:47.780 mccain went after the ufc hard and you know he was a big fight fan so what was happening at the time

00:25:53.980 is that was he doing it to help boxing was that his no no no he was doing what he said was the

00:25:59.940 old owners were running from regulation they weren't being regulated by the athletic commissions

00:26:04.480 which, you know, obviously he didn't like.

00:26:07.500 So he went after him, and we did the exact opposite when we bought the company.

00:26:12.060 We ran toward regulation, and before Senator McCain had passed, you know,

00:26:16.840 he had complimented us on what we had done with the sport, how we cleaned it up,

00:26:20.960 and, you know, he was actually on our side.

00:26:24.900 Huh.

00:26:26.720 Okay, so you acquire the UFC.

00:26:30.420 what what is the what are the biggest steps to making it succeed is it making the live events

00:26:36.220 really fun is it tv rights is it uh recruiting new fighters i mean you got to do all that but

00:26:42.280 what what were the biggest things that mattered that's it all of the above exactly what you just

00:26:46.460 said first and foremost go out and find the best up-and-coming talent people that you think could

00:26:51.780 be world champs or or at least top five fighters in the world you have to go out and get a television

00:26:57.700 deal think about this this thing was in such a bad place it wasn't allowed on pay-per-view

00:27:01.960 you as a grown adult didn't have the right to buy porn was on pay-per-view but the ufc was not

00:27:07.980 allowed and our goal was to get it onto free television which everybody thought was impossible

00:27:13.400 at the time plus when you think about the united states back then um you know all the people that

00:27:20.920 grew up in our era grew up in that john wayne era right where john wayne would hit a guy yeah he

00:27:26.280 fall down you didn't jump on top of them and start you know beating the shit out of them

00:27:30.700 get up you would stand them back up and hit them again right so even his own son and big jake yeah

00:27:36.600 the whole ground game thing was how how we had to uh educate people on and how exciting it could be

00:27:43.260 and um and then i went out to be clear ufc has like what was one of y'all's biggest pay-per-view

00:27:49.720 i remember like looking at the data one time several years ago you guys had some of the

00:27:54.800 biggest pay-per-view events like ever period yeah yeah we did and and i'll think about this

00:27:59.960 it took us a long time to get into new york and uh you know we were being blocked by sheldon silver

00:28:06.960 in new york who was in with the uh with the union keeping us out of new york because of the

00:28:13.360 we are eight of the top 10 all-time gates at madison square garden now in the next two years

00:28:20.840 we'll be 10 of the top 10 all-time gates because we go there every November with a big fight

00:28:26.140 and we break you know last year's record yeah um and you were talking about looking for for

00:28:33.700 great fighters what makes a great fighter what sets someone apart who's great versus someone

00:28:38.300 who's just good well first of all you have to have the talent are you talented enough

00:28:43.240 um to get there and our matchup makers are are great at finding new talent we actually have a

00:28:49.220 show based on it's called the contender series that we do every year and it is all the best

00:28:54.460 reality tv if people haven't watched it it's amazing it's like i i watch it and you get to

00:28:59.580 you feel like you get to know the guys you feel like you get to know their story you feel like

00:29:03.680 you're rooting for them you pick your favorite horse in essence by the middle of the season

00:29:07.160 that's the ultimate fighter yeah that's the ultimate fighter that's what actually launched

00:29:11.580 us and got us onto television and started to build the business the contender series we do

00:29:17.380 once a year we sign the best unsigned fighters in the world they show up one night and they fight

00:29:23.060 right there i don't care what your record is what you've done in the past what are you going to show

00:29:27.480 us right here right now tonight and it's the greatest fight show on television it really is

00:29:32.580 um so all right did you have a view of of best boxer ever do you look at someone and say all

00:29:39.680 right he was the greatest yeah i mean well i mean we just we literally just had this debate a couple

00:29:45.620 weeks ago you know and uh ali is my all-time favorite for many other reasons not just boxing

00:29:52.720 you know what that guy i never did i never did canadian women are looking for more more out of

00:29:59.660 themselves their businesses their elected leaders and the world around them and that's why we're

00:30:04.120 thrilled to introduce the honest talk podcast i'm jennifer stewart and i'm katherine clark and in

00:30:09.900 this podcast we interview canada's most inspiring women entrepreneurs artists athletes politicians

00:30:15.600 and newsmakers all at different stages of their journey so if you're looking to connect then we

00:30:21.160 hope you'll join us listen to the honest talk podcast on iheart radio or wherever you listen

00:30:25.700 to your podcasts all right so as an expert tell me if ali is in a ring with mike tyson both at

00:30:33.300 their prime who wins well as an expert i have no idea but uh that's a good answer it would be a

00:30:42.140 great one it's it's hard to talk about that kind of stuff too because i'm a fan of both guys

00:30:46.140 yeah and both were so different and both brought something different to the sport um i mean when

00:30:51.820 you think about and senator cruz we're the same age that tyson era was unbelievable i mean everybody

00:30:58.700 was in the boxing because of mike tyson it was incredible well he hit so hard and so fast i mean

00:31:04.960 you'd have you'd have matches over in the in the first round because he just knocked everyone out

00:31:10.540 I mean, it was, it was, I'd never seen anything like it.

00:31:14.620 It's true.

00:31:15.260 So Ali brought something different during his era and Tyson brought something different,

00:31:19.800 but the boxing is where it is today because both of them existed and were in the sport.

00:31:25.540 There's no doubt about it.

00:31:26.700 All right.

00:31:27.080 Same question about MMA, best MMA fighter ever.

00:31:30.900 John Jones.

00:31:32.420 Really?

00:31:33.040 Okay.

00:31:33.360 Why?

00:31:34.140 Why?

00:31:34.580 Yeah.

00:31:34.760 Why?

00:31:35.000 That's a good.

00:31:35.520 Well, one of the things that happened in boxing is that you had all these different sanctioning organizations and all anybody and they all had different champions and different guys.

00:31:45.200 And all anybody wanted to do was stay undefeated.

00:31:48.000 So they would fight lesser competition to make sure that they got up to 25 and 0.

00:31:52.880 And, you know, in MMA, you go through the gauntlet.

00:31:57.440 You fight the best of the best all the way to the top.

00:31:59.720 So if you end up with a long career and you are still undefeated, you are the greatest of all time, and that is Jon Jones.

00:32:08.620 And many other reasons.

00:32:10.040 All right, what about if Jon Jones is in the ring with Ali?

00:32:13.940 Who wins that fight?

00:32:15.360 That's kind of, I'm asking the question.

00:32:17.660 Okay, because it's the same question.

00:32:19.240 Remember the Rocky movie where Rocky fights Hulk Hogan and the wrestler versus the boxer?

00:32:25.760 Jon Jones.

00:32:26.600 john jones would get inside he'd grab him and he would rip him apart yes have you ever seen a pro

00:32:33.500 athlete not in your business that you wish you could have taken them and turn them into ufc

00:32:39.860 fighter if you had to pick a celebrity athlete any any sport i don't care it's the olympics

00:32:45.400 but there's got to be talent data that you look at and you're like that guy should have done this

00:32:50.480 and he would have been a beast who would that be yeah absolutely i mean if you look at a lot of

00:32:54.280 these guys that play not just in the nfl but college football too you know when you look at

00:32:59.280 how big and explosive and powerful these guys are had they been training in mixed martial arts their

00:33:05.080 their whole life they would be unbelievable you know and you know he's a big fan and always said

00:33:10.500 he wanted to fight imagine if he trained when he was young as shack i mean as big and as powerful

00:33:15.420 as shack was and you know that would be i met shack when i was at the usc fight with you in miami and

00:33:21.260 He is a huge man.

00:33:22.860 I mean, he's just a mountain of a man.

00:33:24.820 Massive.

00:33:25.180 And one of my all-time favorite killers, you know, the mentality, the talent,

00:33:31.820 and all that stuff.

00:33:32.480 It would have been interesting to see if Michael Jordan, you know,

00:33:35.020 was trained in MMA his whole life.

00:33:38.540 Yeah, he certainly had an unbelievable heart of competition.

00:33:42.720 I mean, you knew at the end of every game he'd have the ball,

00:33:45.480 and he'd be triple teamed, and it wouldn't matter.

00:33:47.220 He was going to score, and he was going to win.

00:33:49.020 So true.

00:33:49.540 And he had that killer mindset, and he was probably the most clutch athlete of all time.

00:33:54.900 Dave, there's a lot of people that listen to this show.

00:33:57.320 They may not actually have known you from UFC.

00:34:00.400 They may know you from seeing you next to Donald Trump.

00:34:03.800 Talk about how you guys became friends.

00:34:06.500 Was it because you both were in this reality TV world and exploded that you both understood entertainment?

00:34:12.320 Was that how you guys originally kind of connected?

00:34:14.820 Was it, you know, he's the apprentice guy, TV, you're doing UFC TV?

00:34:17.760 and then how did you guys become friends it's clear that y'all are friends when you see each

00:34:22.160 other together it's not just hey come to my event like you guys obviously really know each other

00:34:26.860 like each other yeah no it's not any of that at all it's he's a big fight fan he's been a fight

00:34:31.980 since he was young all of his you know the big fights were at his casinos um and he and i met

00:34:40.220 when we did the first fight at the taj mahal he had us think about this the ufc wasn't allowed

00:34:46.040 on pay-per-view no arenas wanted us no venues wanted our events he actually had us at the

00:34:52.660 trump taj mahal showed up for the first fight of the night and stayed till the end both times that

00:34:57.620 we went to the taj and when you think about the trump brand was here ufc brand was here but he

00:35:02.340 got it he liked it and then literally everything good that ever happened to me in my career after

00:35:09.300 that he was always the first one to call or reach out in some way and he was just always a really

00:35:15.380 really good guy and then he reached out and asked me to speak at the republican convention for him

00:35:20.600 and everybody told me not to do it don't do it don't do it don't get into politics

00:35:26.680 and number one and number two he's never gonna win and uh the guy's been a great friend to me

00:35:32.400 so i said there's no way i'm not gonna do it for him i really like this guy and yes he and i are

00:35:37.300 very close friends and and and i love the guy senator and i were both there for that speech

00:35:42.020 what was the biggest shock for you in the reaction from the public? Was it the animosity

00:35:46.100 because you went there and because you spoke? What was the biggest surprise from doing that

00:35:50.320 speech at the convention? I never get any negativity from it ever. It's the exact opposite.

00:35:55.900 When I'm out in the streets and I go places, people always come up to me and say, thanks for,

00:36:00.480 thanks for, I've never, ever had one person walk up to me or yell or say something to me,

00:36:05.880 anything about Trump. And here's the thing. When I do speak, you don't ever hear me talk

00:36:11.580 negatively about the other side i'll tell you why everything they say about this guy is a lie

00:36:17.680 and and he's he's he's not what they say he is he's actually a good man who loves this country

00:36:23.740 cares about people and uh you know i just talk about who he is as a person yeah all right at

00:36:30.960 ufc you hired joe rogan when you hired him and he was just getting started did you did you have

00:36:38.860 any inkling of of what a a major figure what what a really historic figure for free speech he would

00:36:45.260 become did you see that early on no what I saw I was getting into that when we were talking earlier

00:36:50.440 about the ground game so when people didn't understand the ground game the greatest thing I

00:36:56.040 did was bring Joe Rogan in and he started walking people through what was happening while it was

00:37:01.640 actually happening so that you would understand it and when we grew up your parents would put you

00:37:07.040 karate or taekwondo or something like that yeah i did four years of judo there you go this is the

00:37:12.840 martial art now that men women and children are taking all over the world and then joe i remember

00:37:18.920 when joe told me he said hey listen i started a podcast would you come on my podcast i was like

00:37:23.960 what the hell is a podcast he's like well it's like radio when you had lindsey grand on that

00:37:29.640 first time what the hell is a podcast yeah i said wow you gotta do it with really big you gotta do

00:37:36.260 it with the accent. So Lindsey was the very first guest ever on this podcast, and we were meeting

00:37:42.320 in a basement studio in D.C., and we had just burst on and created the podcast, and it skyrocketed

00:37:49.300 to the number one ranked podcast in the world. And so I asked Lindsey to come on, and he comes

00:37:53.800 down to the basement, and his line, he goes, what in the hell is a podcast? And we had this shag

00:38:03.740 carpet from the 70s and and these same big old mics and and lindsey looked around and we were

00:38:09.900 still number one at the time and he goes you're number one who the hell is number two some guy

00:38:15.380 in a van by the river that's funny all right yeah i didn't get it and and rogan was definitely uh

00:38:25.820 very insightful you know in in starting his podcast and and then it just absolutely blew up

00:38:33.160 And he became, you know, the biggest thing in the world.

00:38:36.740 So why do you think he's so good at the podcast business?

00:38:40.400 He's really good at he's really good at.

00:38:43.560 First of all, he talks about a lot of interesting things.

00:38:46.500 He's very smart, obviously, and he's great at speaking to people.

00:38:51.560 He's a good listener, asks great questions and is always talking about interesting stuff with interesting people.

00:38:59.560 And he tried so hard not to get into politics.

00:39:02.540 He tried so hard not to get into politics.

00:39:05.480 Everyone that tries to do that that I know always fails, but that's probably why I know them at that point.

00:39:09.300 All right. Here's another Rogan question.

00:39:12.360 So Rogan had been a Bernie Sanders supporter.

00:39:15.660 Yeah.

00:39:15.960 Then he became a Trump supporter.

00:39:17.720 He's now criticizing Trump on some fronts.

00:39:20.720 What's your sense of sort of where his politics falls?

00:39:24.780 Well, he was very liberal.

00:39:26.740 I mean, he was very liberal.

00:39:27.760 And then when the world started to lose its mind, I mean, if you're not a little right, you're not right.

00:39:38.060 So I think that, you know, a lot of these guys who were liberal at one point, including me, I was too.

00:39:47.620 So what changed your views?

00:39:50.220 Common sense. Common sense. And a lot of the other nutty stuff that was going on.

00:39:57.760 Yeah. Listen, taxes are never going to go away. That's always going to be a thing. But, you know, when I talked to Joe about having Trump on the podcast, his big thing was, and I was the one pushing the president to do these podcasts.

00:40:14.800 yep so i brought the nelk boys on air force one at the end of his uh at the end of his his first

00:40:21.480 term and you know there's that uh conference room in the back and we were in the conference room

00:40:27.980 and then finally he called us up to his office and when i brought the nelk boys into his office

00:40:32.460 i could tell by the look on his face because he was like what what the hell are you are you doing

00:40:37.920 right because i called jared kushner and i said jared i want to bring these kids the nelk boys

00:40:44.020 you know because he was picking me up in vegas and we were flying to arizona i said i want to

00:40:48.100 bring these kids with us and he said yeah i'm not asking him that you are so i i end up asking him

00:40:54.240 we do it and to to the president's credit he gets done with this rally in arizona and he sees this

00:41:01.180 kid steve who is you know a very famous kid you know in the influencer world and he was on the

00:41:07.240 plane with us and and the president and he called them up on stage and he steve started doing the

00:41:12.800 ymca thing the crowd erupted and after that the president agreed to do their podcast he did the

00:41:19.560 knelt boy podcast and the thing went to something crazy like 10 million views in four hours and

00:41:25.400 youtube pulled it down and that's when all hell broke loose and then the president was all in on

00:41:30.920 podcasts and and the reason i love the president doing these kids podcasts that are an hour two

00:41:37.580 hours or the joe rogan three-hour podcast yeah is because he is a real guy a guy's guy who can

00:41:42.980 sit there and talk so joe said i'll i'll do it but i'm gonna invite kamala harris to do it too

00:41:51.700 i'm gonna i'm gonna invite both yeah she can't do a three-hour podcast no no she

00:41:56.960 she cannot so so trump shows up they go three and change right he's late for his next rally

00:42:05.800 and it's incredible so they reach out to Harris's team and they said well here's what you're gonna

00:42:12.020 do you're gonna have to fly to LA we'll give you 20 minutes and we need to know all the questions

00:42:17.200 ahead of time and Joe's like that is not what I do yeah have you ever watched my podcast you would

00:42:21.760 know that's not gonna fly yep and then now now everybody gets the podcast thing I want to be

00:42:28.660 honest with you for a second about how an act of compassion really feels a couple of years ago I

00:42:34.360 made the choice to partner with an amazing organization called Compassion International.

00:42:40.220 Why? Because I wanted to sponsor a child in need. It was a nice idea, sure, but I had no idea just

00:42:47.700 how much that simple act would change my life as well. I sponsored Nadia and got to watch her life

00:42:54.900 change right in front of my eyes, going from starving literally alone on the streets to

00:43:00.800 getting the health care and education she needs to reach her God-given full potential.

00:43:06.820 I got to be a part of that change, and the light of that compassion not only illuminates

00:43:12.020 in her, it illuminates now in me.

00:43:15.160 That is the power of compassion.

00:43:17.300 The light of Christ shines on all of us.

00:43:21.560 Feel it for yourself and change literally a child's life.

00:43:25.560 Change the world, and you also change yourself.

00:43:28.640 You can sponsor a child today.

00:43:30.600 Visit Compassion.com.

00:43:33.100 That's Compassion.com.

00:43:36.280 Let me ask you a legacy question.

00:43:39.300 As we get close to wrapping things up here, I always love asking people, especially right around your age,

00:43:45.420 when you've worked really hard, you did something incredible.

00:43:48.560 Listen, Skippy, we don't need any of these lines about your age.

00:43:52.140 You know, one of these days you'll hit puberty and you'll get a little wisdom like Dana and me.

00:43:57.000 But if that's the biggest rip on the 44-year-old right now, I feel very good about it.

00:44:01.840 I feel great about it.

00:44:03.400 But there's a certain point where you're like, all right, I worked hard.

00:44:06.840 I put my head down.

00:44:07.600 I got a lot done.

00:44:09.220 And then there's like, all right, what's next?

00:44:11.900 Do you have contentment?

00:44:13.260 What do you want the next 10 years to be of your career, your legacy?

00:44:17.240 I mean, now you're at the point where you can kind of pick and choose what you do.

00:44:20.700 You built this brand.

00:44:21.880 But what is it that makes you wake up every day and what excites you?

00:44:24.940 yeah i mean the the level that we built this company and what we've done with combat sports

00:44:30.540 globally still fires me up now we're getting into boxing uh you know we're adding on to the

00:44:37.180 ali act which i know you know about senator and uh you know we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna

00:44:42.340 build boxing into a massive business again globally so you know i still have goals for the ufc i have

00:44:49.480 goals for boxing and other things that I'm into.

00:44:53.320 Beyond that, I don't know.

00:44:54.860 I mean, I got three great kids.

00:44:57.380 You know, when I think about legacy, my legacy is my kids and their kids.

00:45:01.540 And, you know, I don't think much about I love what I do.

00:45:04.300 It's what gets me up every day.

00:45:05.980 And I'm still just as passionate now as I was about it 25 years ago.

00:45:10.920 So I don't know.

00:45:12.440 I don't know the answer to that question.

00:45:13.800 Just going to get up and keep grinding.

00:45:15.360 Love it.

00:45:16.820 All right.

00:45:17.400 Different question.

00:45:18.620 Movies.

00:45:18.980 I'm a big movie buff for a boxing aficionado.

00:45:25.720 What's the best Rocky movie?

00:45:28.620 Rocky 3.

00:45:29.680 Rocky 3.

00:45:30.740 All right.

00:45:31.120 Clubber Lang.

00:45:32.200 Yeah.

00:45:32.520 Yep.

00:45:33.140 Rocky 3.

00:45:33.780 I love it.

00:45:34.580 Me and the president argue about this all the time.

00:45:36.640 What's his?

00:45:37.600 One.

00:45:38.120 Rocky 1.

00:45:39.380 What's the logic behind his?

00:45:41.360 What's his argument?

00:45:42.100 What's yours?

00:45:42.880 And I might be Rocky 2.

00:45:44.520 So that's interesting.

00:45:45.940 That's awesome.

00:45:46.580 And I'll tell you something else about Rocky.

00:45:48.980 It's the only fight movie other than like Raging Bull, which is a true story and, you know, that I actually really like, like a fictional boxing movie, fight movie that I actually like.

00:46:00.760 And we can actually debate as men.

00:46:03.200 What's your favorite?

00:46:04.120 One, two, three or four.

00:46:05.520 Once you get past four, you lose.

00:46:07.020 Yeah, four.

00:46:07.580 But four was pretty awesome, too.

00:46:09.380 Like, you know, Ivan Drago, if he dies, he dies.

00:46:15.480 So true.

00:46:16.000 So make your argument on why yours is number one and what's the president's argument on one.

00:46:21.880 Well, I loved that in Rocky III, you know, he had had all this success and, you know, then you have Clever Lang who's hungry coming up and Mick is trying to avoid him because he thinks he's going to murder Rocky.

00:46:35.820 And, you know, I just I loved everything.

00:46:38.280 I thought Mr. T absolutely murdered that role and could not have been better in it.

00:46:44.740 and uh i don't know i just that's the that's the one out of the three that hit me the most

00:46:49.520 they're all great one's great two's great four's great um why did trump say number one what was

00:46:55.640 his argument on number one being the best i think because if you didn't see you know rocky one

00:47:02.060 happened and then all the other ones by you you didn't see a place where actually the guy who's

00:47:06.960 the hero of the movie is going to lose uh the fight you know and obviously the the the major

00:47:13.520 success the movie and Stallone had coming out of that and and the story of Stallone and and how he

00:47:20.180 built the movie I don't know I guess that's it Rocky 1 is great I'm not diminishing Rocky 1 I

00:47:26.040 just think Rocky 3 is better I gotta say I gotta say too look I gotta say it because I like winning

00:47:33.760 Rocky 1 is pretty awesome but but then he loses and and Rocky 2 he comes back he gets it done it's

00:47:39.880 three is awesome too. So I mean, it's a hard, but like Rocky two is when he like finishes the job

00:47:46.360 and gets it done. Uh, but you know, I, I gotta say one of the things that's fun about the whole

00:47:51.140 Rocky, you know, and Stallone obviously created the character and, and the, the whole Rocky saga

00:47:57.140 actually think has a lot in common with president Trump. Because if you look at, at Rocky Balboa,

00:48:02.300 you know, he's not the fastest hitter. He's not the strongest hitter. He just

00:48:09.360 keeps frigging going. He's like the Terminator, no matter, I mean, it's nothing stops him and he

00:48:15.780 just goes and goes and goes. And that's very much Donald Trump. You know, Donald Trump used to say

00:48:20.640 he, no president has been as persecuted as he was. And I got to say a few years ago,

00:48:25.240 I wasn't sure that was true. And then the indictments come and they try to bankrupt him

00:48:30.400 bankrupt his kids and and it is now clearly true it's unequivocally and and there are very few

00:48:36.800 human beings who could have gone through what trump went through when the democrats were trying

00:48:42.300 to do everything they could to stop his re-election and it reminds me of rocky balboa that no matter

00:48:47.260 how many times they hit him he just keeps coming the most resilient human being that i have ever

00:48:53.740 met in my life and as his friend you know i used to tell him when he was going through this stuff

00:48:58.160 i'd be like what are you doing why don't you just you know and and you know what he would say

00:49:03.700 do i have a choice you absolutely have a choice yes you can stop doing this shit to yourself but

00:49:11.860 he is unstoppable the most resilient human being i've ever met in my life i absolutely love the

00:49:20.320 guy and uh yeah nobody when he won this last election i mean i don't know if anybody was

00:49:27.380 happier for him than me and i was with him the whole night all the way through it and uh it's

00:49:32.920 just i tell people this all the time and senator cruz tell me if i'm wrong and i've actually brought

00:49:40.260 people kid rock brought bill maher to the white house right and even bill maher who has hated this

00:49:48.080 guy for 30 years had to go on a show and say the guy that i've hated for 30 years was not present

00:49:53.640 at this dinner. Anybody who thinks they don't like Trump, I dare you to go to dinner with him

00:49:59.200 for an hour. You cannot walk out of there and go, I hate that guy. It's impossible.

00:50:04.500 He can be amazingly charming. He's funny as all get out. And I'll give Marr some credit too,

00:50:09.500 because he was honest about that. And listen, you know, Marr is someone who I used to disagree

00:50:15.460 with. I find myself agreeing with him more and more. And I feel like Bill Marr is an old school

00:50:21.080 liberal that his party went crazy. And he's sitting there going, OK, how about like free

00:50:27.740 speech matters and don't embrace crazy Islamists who want to kill us? And suddenly that makes him

00:50:33.620 feel like a right winger. Yeah. And it's not Bill Maher is a common sense guy. Like I was saying,

00:50:39.200 he's a guy who isn't afraid to stand up for common sense. And yeah, that night was actually

00:50:46.100 really really cool at the white he was hilarious the president was hilarious and think about this

00:50:51.540 bill maher has been pumping the democrat agenda for you know 30 40 whatever how many years he's

00:50:58.900 never been invited to the white house and never toured the white house president trump was the

00:51:03.140 first one yeah no what are you see not one democrat ever asked bill maher the white house

00:51:07.340 nope wow what a missed opportunity pretty crazy and and the president gave him an incredible tour

00:51:13.960 after it was over and you know and those two talked all night me and kid rocks they had out

00:51:18.640 of their way they talked all night they agreed they argued they this and that and that's how

00:51:23.320 it's supposed to be yeah well and mar is smart and and he'll engage on on real issues you know

00:51:29.900 i did his show a couple of years ago and at the end when the cameras were off um i i i said bill

00:51:36.700 you know i i gotta thank you for for endorsing me for president he's like what are you talking

00:51:40.900 about and and in 2016 when when it when it was down to trump and me running mar did a whole show

00:51:48.160 and he said okay so you've got trump and cruz and he said it's a little bit like malaria or the

00:51:54.340 bubonic plague he's like i hate them both but he said if you give me that choice and he pulled out

00:52:01.860 a red hat that said better ted than dead so he said compared to trump he decided to endorse me

00:52:08.500 And he'd forgotten about it. And I had a picture, a screenshot of him wearing the hat that said, better Ted than dead.

00:52:16.640 And I signed it and said, you know, thanks for your visionary, visionary wisdom.

00:52:22.280 And he he cracked up laughing. I think he'd forgotten all about it.

00:52:25.960 He is funny and he is smart. And I've been a fan of his for years.

00:52:30.220 So to be there that night and see it all play out was what's funny is, you know,

00:52:35.480 the president always busts my ball because i don't wear suits right so i don't wear suits and and and

00:52:41.240 when bill maher walked into the oval office he's got a suit on the whole thing he's like there's

00:52:46.400 no way i was showing up here without a suit and he looks at me and he goes that's definitely from

00:52:51.600 the zelinski collection but by the way i i will say there was a funny thing i saw on twitter like

00:53:02.340 When Zelensky showed up for one of the White House meetings again in his sweatshirt, someone said he should have said, look, look, Mr. President, I showed up with a suit, but when I landed, some guy from the Biden administration stole my luggage.

00:53:15.480 Do you remember that weird transgender cross-dresser who was in the Biden administration who was stealing suitcases at the airport?

00:53:24.980 Like it was a bizarre little story.

00:53:27.280 Multiple times.

00:53:28.080 And caught on film.

00:53:29.360 Like it was one of the odder things.

00:53:31.540 All right. Last question. How cool is it for our nation's 250th birthday to be doing a UFC fight at the White House on the South Lawn?

00:53:41.780 Surreal. Amazing. And how many people have called you for a ticket already? That's what I really want to know.

00:53:48.520 It's crazy. But we're going to put on one of the greatest live events anybody has ever seen.

00:53:54.000 And yeah, I'm really excited about it.

00:53:57.120 All right. And by the way, I'm going to shamelessly get in line.

00:53:59.880 I already told my team, I want to be there, come hooker by crook.

00:54:03.480 I ain't missing this.

00:54:04.740 I love it.

00:54:05.380 I look forward to seeing you there, Senator.

00:54:07.800 Excellent.

00:54:08.280 Dana, thank you for joining us.

00:54:09.480 This was a lot of fun.

00:54:10.380 I appreciate you.

00:54:11.320 Thank you for your leadership, your courage.

00:54:14.780 And by the way, everything you've built UFC into now,

00:54:18.040 I look forward to the next 5, 10, 20 years and where it goes.

00:54:21.600 You got a lot to do in business, and the country's got a lot to do going forward.

00:54:26.120 Thank you, sir.

00:54:26.840 I appreciate it.

00:54:27.640 Congratulations on all your success

00:54:30.120 Appreciate it

00:54:31.240 Don't forget we do this show Monday, Wednesday and Friday

00:54:33.920 Hit that subscribe or auto download button

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00:54:37.700 Share this on social media

00:54:39.060 Write us a five star review as well

00:54:40.660 And we'll see you back here in a couple of days

Verdict with Ted Cruz - March 16, 2026

The Great Dana White One-on-One： Trump, Boxing, Ali vs Tyson, UFC, Business, Exercise & Weight Loss plus the Best Rocky Movie Ever

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