In the lead-up to UFC Freedom 250 – the cagefighting spectacle that took place on the South Lawn of the White House to mark Donald Trump’s eightieth birthday this previous summer season – the FBI announced that a handful of UFC fighters would go to the bureau for an unique coaching seminar for federal brokers.
Taking place at the FBI Special Agent Academy in Quantico, Virginia, the March seminar put roughly 300 federal brokers and academy college students through specialised hand-to-hand fight coaching with seven previous and present UFC fighters, including former middleweight champion Chris Weidman, who was pictured giving attendees advice on fending off attackers.
The two-day seminar included photo-ops with the fighters, who wore branded UFC-FBI coaching gear. FBI director Kash Patel also posed for photographs with federal brokers, and appeared to be handing out signed headshots of himself.
“[UFC CEO] Dana White has changed the game in the mixed martial arts industry and we’re extremely honored to be partnered with him, the professionals, and the UFC,” Patel said in the UFC press release. “We are grateful for their shared love of our nation, so that we can better defend her.”
Now, six months after the initial seminar, the FBI seems to be in the course of of awarding the UFC an unique contract to practice brokers in combined martial arts, further cementing the relationship between the preventing group and the Trump administration.
In September, the bureau filed a Sole Source Justification kind, a doc that permits the authorities to award contracts without contemplating bids from other firms. The bureau claimed that the UFC was “uniquely qualified” to present these providers, noting in the kind that “the trainers provided by UFC have the skills necessary to instruct striking techniques, grappling/takedowns, weapon defense, ground control, as well as conditioning to the standard that the FBI expects and requires.”
The doc says that the unique contract would be restricted to a single yr, while a potential long-term contract would be open to aggressive bidding following “market research.” The precise sum that the FBI plans to pay the UFC is not disclosed.
The FBI claims the UFC collaboration is half of an initiative to present revolutionary coaching for its brokers, but it also seems to be a half of the sustained consolidation of the UFC-Trump alliance.
Over the previous decade, the UFC has emerged as one of Trump’s most influential and dependable companions. The promotion’s proprietor, Ari Emanuel, was once Trump’s agent and has helped steer the UFC’s rightward shift. White is a close buddy of the president, and has stumped for him over the course of three presidential campaigns. White also claimed accountability for Trump’s media strategy to bypass conventional media in favor of various platforms within the “manosphere” catering to younger males – a course of motion that helped him secure reelection in November 2024.
The UFC has also gone to great lengths to platform Trump and his political agenda. The group produced a propaganda documentary on Trump called Combatant-in-Chief, which perpetuated the lie that Trump was instrumental to the UFC’s survival during a darkish period in its historical past. Trump welcomed the consideration, basking in the admiration of the UFC’s conservative-leaning male viewers. He cultivated relationships with fighters, leveraging their support to painting himself as a symbolic strongman. He has embraced the UFC’s tradition of defiance, machismo and spectacle to help buttress his image as a insurgent against liberal norms.
Since then, the UFC has been rewarded handsomely for its loyalty, not least by turning into the first skilled sports activities model to host an occasion at the White House – a propaganda spectacle that blended patriotism with bloodlust for a night time of authoritarian theatre.
The Trump administration has also formalized its relationship with the UFC by signing a memorandum of understanding with the US Department of State to start “sports diplomacy” initiatives, further integrating the promotion into official authorities coverage and smooth energy strategy. The UFC also started a sponsorship deal with Anduril, a controversial protection tech start-up identified for developing AI-powered battle machines and sentry towers used to survey the US-Mexico border. Anduril occurs to be a key beneficiary of the Trump administration’s ongoing effort to reindustrialize the US army.
The UFC continues to benefit from its allegiance to Trump, most lately through the FBI coaching program.
The UFC-FBI program is far from distinctive: army and police forces around the world have undergone unarmed fight coaching. In 2024, the Canadian army organized jiu-jitsu seminars for varied items. Gulf states such as the UAE incorporate Brazilian jiu-jitsu apply in their army and police coaching. Several FBI brokers also have expertise with unarmed fight, including retired agent George Piro, who led the FBI’s interrogation of Saddam Hussein. After retiring from the bureau, Piro won his division at the IBJJF (International Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Federation) World No-Gi Championship.
But, even given that historical past, the FBI’s UFC partnership reeks of favoritism. While it stays unclear how the coaching program will be structured or which fighters will be chosen to lead the seminars, it is price noting that several of the UFC fighters who took half in the coaching seminar in March 2026 were affiliated with the Trump administration, or with Patel personally. For instance, Former UFC fighter Jorge Masvidal headlined a “Fighters Against Socialism” tour across Florida alongside Donald Trump Jr forward of the 2020 election. Another coach at the March seminar, UFC light-weight champion Justin Gaethje, stumped for Trump on quite a few events, including at the 2026 midterm conference in Dallas, where he urged Republicans to vote with the same gusto they did in 2024.
Several of the fighters at the coaching seminar were also managed by Ali Abdelaziz, a controversial determine in the sport who once labored as an informant for the FBI and the New York Police Department. He was recruited to work undercover accumulating intelligence on a terrorism-linked group named Muslims of the Americas but his covert relationship with the US authorities was finally severed when brokers reportedly had suspicions about his reliability.
Despite his controversial previous, Abdelaziz emerged as one of the most influential managers in combined martial arts, with a roster of purchasers packed with previous and present UFC champions. He also established relationships with Maga operatives like Richard Grenell, who served as performing director of national intelligence under Trump in 2020, as effectively as with Patel. Abdelaziz used his place as a supervisor and public determine to marketing campaign for Patel to land the FBI director position, even using his roster of fighters’ social media accounts to unfold the phrase. He later attended Patel’s Senate affirmation listening to and was current at the joint UFC-FBI coaching seminar. Last month, Abdelaziz was pictured partying with the FBI director at the marriage ceremony for Trump’s former lawyer Alina Habba – despite once being suspected of being a double agent by the same federal company that Patel now runs.
While Patel may proceed to make a case for a partnership with the UFC, the reality is that this is merely the newest instance of how MMA – and the UFC in explicit – have become deeply intertwined with US politics, particularly among Republicans keen to bask in the mirrored glory of the literal robust guys they’re bringing into the fold.
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