Brendan Schaub: UFC hosting event at the White House 'should be celebrated'
The UFC is planning on hosting an event at the White House. This news has been received with a range of reactions, as things often do in today's political climate. However, former UFC fighter Brendan Schaub says fans should see the potential event as a positive, regardless of their political affiliation.
MMA, which has been around for about 30 years, battled for decades to gain mainstream approval in the U.S. – from getting the sport sanctioned to getting the product on television. Today, it's a much more different story, as MMA has gained a lot of popularity, especially among young males, and found on ESPN, and it's covered by most, if not all, major publications to some degree.
Schaub sees the UFC's planned event at the White House as another sign of the sport's growth.
"I knew about the UFC White House event – and this isn't a flex – I knew it was confirmed for like four months now," Schaub said on his YouTube channel. "Everyone wants to fight on that card at the White House. It's insane. Now, if you make it political, 'Oh, God. UFC is so tied in with Trump.' Just take all that out of it, whoever you voted for, this is how far the UFC has come: The UFC is fighting at the White House. That's insane, that should be celebrated."
"I don't give a f*ck if Kamala Harris or Pete Buttigieg was the President. Dude, if the UFC is at the White House, it's insane. You know how big that is? That's so cool, despite if you swing right or swing left. Take all that out of it. The UFC is having an event at the freaking White House. That's so cool. Everyone and their mothers wants to fight at the White House."
There has not been an official announcement or booking of the event, but President Donald Trump said last Thursday that next year's Independence Day celebration will involve a UFC event on White House grounds. A UFC spokesperson confirmed the news to NBC on Friday. Trump has long been associated with UFC and MMA, even prior to his presidency. He's often seen at UFC events.
Schaub feels given the nature of the occasion, UFC should put forth their American talent, and mentioned fighters such as Kayla Harrison, Michael Chandler, Colby Covington, and Bo Nickal.
"You're going to have to have American fighters on there, clearly, right?," Schaub said. "We're not going to do this Noche UFC where we have a Brazilian headlining it. We got to have Americans. The problem is we don't have Americans thriving, especially as champ status."
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Different jurisdictions, different laws In 2023, Illinois became the first state to completely eliminate cash bail when the state Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the law abolishing it. The move was part of an expansive criminal justice overhaul adopted in 2021 known as the SAFE-T Act . Under the change, a judge decides whether to release the defendant prior to their trial, weighing factors such as their criminal charges, if they could pose any danger to others and if they are considered a flight risk. Loyola University of Chicago's Center for Criminal Justice published a 2024 report on Illinois' new cashless bail policy, one year after it went into effect. It acknowledges that there is not yet enough data to know what impact the law has had on crime, but that crime in Illinois did not increase after its implementation. Violent and property crime declined in some counties. A number of other jurisdictions , including New Jersey, New Mexico and Washington, D.C., have nearly eliminated cash bail or limited its use. Many include exceptions for high-level crimes. Proponents of eliminating cash bail describe it as a penalty on poverty , suggesting that the wealthy can pay their way out of jail to await trial while those with fewer financial resources have to sit it out behind bars. Critics have argued that bail is a time-honored way to ensure defendants released from jail show up for court proceedings. They warn that violent criminals will be released pending trial, giving them license to commit other crimes. A lack of consensus Studies have shown mixed results regarding the impact of cashless bail on crime. Many focus on the recidivism of individual defendants rather than overall crime rates. A 2024 report published by the Brennan Center for Justice saw 'no statistically significant relationship' between bail reform and crime rates. It looked at crime rate data from 2015 through 2021 for 33 cities across the U.S., 22 of which had instituted some type of bail reform. Researchers used a statistical method to determine if crime rates had diverged in those with reforms and those without. Ames Grawert, the report's co-author and senior counsel in the Brennan Center's Justice Program, said this conclusion 'holds true for trends in crime overall or specifically violent crime.' Similarly, a 2023 paper published in the American Economic Journal found no evidence that cash bail helps ensure defendants will show up in court or prevents crime among those who are released while awaiting trial. The paper evaluated the impact of a 2018 policy instituted by the Philadelphia's district attorney that instructed prosecutors not to set bail for certain offenses. A 2019 court decree in Harris County, Texas, requires most people charged with a misdemeanor to be released without bail while awaiting trial. The latest report from the monitoring team responsible for tracking the impact of this decision, released in 2024, notes that the number of people arrested for misdemeanors has declined by more than 15% since 2015. The number of those rearrested within one year has similarly declined, with rearrest rates remaining stable in recent years. Asked what data Trump was using to support his claim, the White House pointed to a 2022 report from the district attorney's office in Yolo County, California, that looked at how a temporary cashless bail system implemented across the state to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks in courts and jails impacted recidivism. It found that out of 595 individuals released between April 2020 and May 2021 under this system, 70.6% were arrested again after they were released. A little more than half were rearrested more than once. A more recent paper, published in February by the IZA Institute of Labor Economics, also explored the effects of California's decision to suspend most bail during the COVID-19 pandemic. It reports that implementation of this policy 'caused notable increases in both the likelihood and number of rearrests within 30 days.' However, a return to cash bail did not impact the number of rearrests for any type of offense. The paper acknowledges that other factors, such as societal disruption from the pandemic, could have contributed to the initial increase. Many contributing factors It is difficult to pinpoint specific explanations for why crime rises and falls. The American Bail Coalition's Clayton noted that other policies that have had a negative impact on crime, implemented concurrently with bail reforms, make it 'difficult to isolate or elevate one or more causes over the others.' Paul Heaton, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania who studies criminal justice interventions, had a similar outlook. 'Certainly there are some policy levers that people look at — the size of the police force and certain policies around sentencing,' he said. 'But there's a lot of variation in crime that I think even criminologists don't necessarily fully understand.' ___ Find AP Fact Checks here: . Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request. There was a problem with the recaptcha. Please try again. You may unsubscribe at any time. By signing up, you agree to our terms of use and privacy policy . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google privacy policy and terms of service apply. Want more of the latest from us? Sign up for more at our newsletter page .
