Donald Trump will not be in attendance at UFC 322, and a prominent analyst in mixed martial arts thinks this is ultimately a net positive. The US president not being cageside for this weekend’s UFC pay-per-view offering was revealed by UFC figurehead Dana White.

Trump has been featured at multiple events before in a visible cageside spot, but White mentioned that this would not be the case at this weekend’s Madison Square Garden offering. White mentioned this in an interview with Fox Sports Australia, and it made the rounds on social media aggregator accounts.

Retweeting a post from X account @acdmma_, which was centric on Trump not being in attendance for UFC 322, Luke Thomas said,

“Best event of the year confirmed.”

Donald Trump’s past with the UFC events

Donald Trump does have a track record of attending UFC events during his first and now second US presidential terms, but his ties go back even deeper. At UFC 244 in 2019, Trump was there in attendance for the famous BMF title fight between Jorge Masvidal and Nate Diaz, with the former being crowned as the inaugural titleholder within the history of the novelty title.

There were also appearances at live events from the Ultimate Fighting Championship that took place between his two terms serving in office, with Trump notably appearing at cards like UFC 295, UFC 299, as well as UFC 302. Trump’s appearance at UFC 309 during the promotion’s last trek to Madison Square Garden saw the controversial figure seated cageside to see Jon Jones take on Stipe Miocic just weeks after securing his second term in office.

UFC 316 was the last card the sitting US president was seen at, with Trump showing face in New Jersey to take in the rematch between Sean O’Malley and Merab Dvalishvili. The Trump and White connections also go back to a more turbulent time for the promotion, with Trump having many UFC cards at his venues when the sport overall was bogged down domestically by regulatory hurdles aplenty. That being said, Dana White is not a political guy though.