As President Trump prepares to host UFC cage fights on the White House lawn to celebrate 250 years of American democracy and his own 80th birthday, viewers who dig displays of domination will be exhilarated. But why stop at blood sport?
The ratings could be higher if Trump added even more provocative spectacles. Have J. D. Vance sit in a dunk tank in the Rose Garden where any Mar-a-Lago member can have a throw! Have a Twinkie-eating contest in the Situation Room! And given that the UFC is already doing weigh-ins right there at the Lincoln Memorial and the Reflecting Pool is newly painted, why not throw a spring-break-style rager for the overflow crowd? After all, industrial-grade foam cannons cost less than $3,000.
You’ve probably guessed that my own preference is no vulgar entertainment at the White House, but not because I don’t enjoy any forms of it or wish to sneer at fans of UFC. It’s my preference for the same reason that I’d gladly gamble on a Saturday night at a basement poker table but not on Sunday morning at a church altar: There are times and places for things.
Most presidents have tried to maintain decorum at their residence, knowing the White House is a symbol of the United States and that its gravitas is the work of generations. White House events needn’t be fancy or cater to elites in order to be appropriate. The venue belongs to champion Little League teams as much as it belongs to the winner of the Masters, as much to bluegrass bands as to classical cellists. But there’s a difference between popular entertainment and what Trump is planning, which many citizens find distasteful—and is thus unsuited for a jubilee meant to unite us.
Trump isn’t known to prioritize respectability arguments or appeals to civic virtue. In fact, you might expect all sorts of vulgar entertainment from a former casino and beauty-pageant owner, if entertainment were the only purpose. But like a Roman emperor presiding over combat at the Colosseum, Trump hosting a cage fight serves a purpose beyond merely titillating the masses. It is a political tactic whereby Trump draws on violence—or imagery of violence—in order to be seen as strong.
The gambit perhaps first occurred to him in 1989, when Trump discerned that he could raise his own profile by associating himself with the popular thirst for violent retribution. After a jogger was raped in Central Park, he took out a full-page ad in four newspapers that began “Bring Back the Death Penalty.” “I want to hate these muggers and murderers,” Trump wrote. “They should be forced to suffer.” (Several Black and Latino teenagers would later be wrongfully convicted in the case.)
As a presidential candidate and elected official, Trump has gone much further. In 2024, The Atlantic compiled a brief history of his violent remarks, which then totaled at least 40 instances and has only increased. In 2016, Trump sought to convey that he dominates and humiliates his political opponents by posting GIFs that portrayed him wrestling a CNN logo to the mat and hitting a golf ball into Hillary Clinton’s back. He tried to cultivate an image as a tough guy by suggesting that protesters at rallies deserved to be roughed up by the crowd, and promising to pay the legal fees of those who did so. As president in 2017, he told a crowd of law-enforcement officers that they should be less careful about protecting the heads of arrestees while putting them in police cars. After Representative Greg Gianforte physically assaulted a reporter in 2018, Trump said, “Any guy who can do a body slam, he’s my guy.”
Until Trump, modern presidents generally treated the killings of terrorists with solemnity, underscoring the notion that it is rooted in lawful justice meted out by the state, not bloodlust or personal vengeance. When Barack Obama announced the death of Osama Bin Laden in 2011, he spoke about how the aftermath of 9/11 left “a gaping hole in our hearts” and united people “as one American family.” When Trump announced the death of the Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2019, he seemed to want to personally humiliate him, emphasizing that al-Baghdadi died “like a dog” after “running into a dead-end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way.”
In his second term, Trump said of the U.S. Navy, “We’re like pirates.” His administration has killed more than 200 people on board various boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific Ocean, then posted memes celebrating the strikes. Reflecting on the administration’s videos and memes, the Marine Corps veteran Phil Klay wrote, “I suspect the question the administration cares about is not ‘is this legal,’ ‘is this a war crime,’ ‘is this murder’ or even ‘is this good for America,’ but rather, ‘isn’t this violence delightful?’” I suspect that the propaganda surrounding the boat strikes is mostly meant to associate Trump with strength, dominance, and the ability to vanquish.
Lots of presidents have deported migrants who are here unlawfully, but Trump has made a show of sending some to a foreign prison notorious for abusing inmates. His Department of Homeland Security regularly posts photos of people being deported, emphasizing and celebrating their shackles. Again and again, at rallies, on social media, and most infamously on January 6, parts of Trump’s base have been invigorated by violent spectacle.
On Trump’s 80th birthday, blood sport will be the diversion of choice at the White House because he wants to associate his presidency and himself with the violent domination and humiliation of rivals. America itself is weaker now on the world stage than it was when Trump began either of his presidencies. But when one cage fighter pummels another inside the octagon next weekend, Trump will benefit if Americans think the same thing that Joe Rogan said in a podcast episode about the event: That’s “so Trump.”
The post Donald Trump’s Violent Birthday Bash appeared first on The Atlantic.
