President Trump may be looking for a combative voice in the White House briefing room, but his proposal to UFC president Dana White sparked an entirely different fight online: a name-based guessing game.
Trump said Saturday that he had offered the Ultimate Fighting Championship chief the position of White House press secretary. Soon afterward, social media users began joking that the president might have mistaken the MMA executive for Dana W. White, a former senior Pentagon communications official with the same name.
The tongue-in-cheek theory spread rapidly on X. Users speculated that someone may have recommended Dana W. White, formerly an assistant to the secretary of defense for public affairs and the Pentagon’s chief spokesperson, only for Trump to hear “Dana White” and assume they meant the UFC promoter.
“I guarantee you someone recommended her to Trump, and he thought they meant UFC Dana White and nobody is allowed to correct him lol,” one user wrote in a post that drew more than seven million views.
Other users joined in, with one comparing the alleged confusion to the notorious 2020 Four Seasons Total Landscaping news conference.
“So what are the chances someone suggested this Dana White and Trump pulled a Four Seasons Total Landscaping?” another person posted.
Dana W. White, however, seemed happy to deliver the punchline herself.
“To everyone texting me congratulations: thank you, but you have the wrong Dana White,” she wrote Saturday on LinkedIn.
“I’ve stood at a podium and taken questions from the Pentagon press corps. I have never stood in an octagon. I’d like to keep it that way,” she added.
“It is nice for once that, that Dana White is being confused with this Dana White. Best of luck to the next White House Press Secretary!”
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Dana W. White served as the Pentagon’s leading public affairs official during Trump’s first term, working under then-Defense Secretary James Mattis and managing communications and media relations for the Defense Department.
Her résumé also includes a stint as an editorial writer for The Wall Street Journal, work as a publicist for Fox News and service as a foreign policy adviser to the late Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign.
Still, there is no indication that Trump actually confused the two women. The claim appears to have originated as an internet joke rather than a factual account of how the offer was made.
The UFC executive has maintained a close relationship with Trump for years and has been a prominent supporter. White spoke at the Republican National Conventions in 2016, 2020 and 2024.
Trump said Saturday that he had offered the press secretary role to the UFC boss, describing him as a “violent Fighter and Warrior” and suggesting that White could bring several UFC fighters into the administration as assistants.
“We need these people to defend us against the Lunatic Left,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Dana will be a Press Secretary like none other. Dana, please take the job!”
White later posted an AI-generated image of himself standing behind the White House briefing-room podium on Instagram, alongside the caption, “On to the next chapter.”
He told reporters at a boxing event in London that he planned to travel to Washington to meet with Trump on Monday and would have more to say after that meeting.
The White House has not confirmed whether White will accept the position.
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