UFC President Dana White grilled about slapping wife in 2022

Ultimate Fighting Championship head Dana White had few answers for his actions a couple years ago.

At a New Year’s Eve celebration in Mexico at the end of 2022, White was filmed slapping his wife in the midst of a physical altercation. As seen in the video, he appeared to grab wife, Anne, by the wrist, and she struck him in the face. He responded by slapping her back, before others intervened. White received no public punishment from his organization, and no charges were filed.

White and his wife both explained later that alcohol played a factor into tensions escalating between them, resulting in them slapping one another. After regularly declaring that “there is never an excuse for a man to put his hands on a woman,” he did so and did not receive any notable consequences. White suggested that the stigma of him doing so was his punishment, that he would always been known as a man who struck his wife.

Rules for thee, not for me

Appearing on a recent episode of “The Breakfast Club” hosted by Charlamagne tha God, Jess Hilarious, DJ Envy and Loren LoRosa, White was asked numerous challenging questions ranging from the operation of the UFC to his incident with his wife. Putting White on the spot, Charlamagne asked the UFC president what would happen if a fighter was filmed striking their partner in a public setting.

“It’s happened, don’t you [know],” White retorted. “You know what’s funny is that…it’s not funny but, I used to say that you don’t recover from those [offenses]. Those are the ones you don’t recover from.”

Charlamagne replied, “But you did.” White’s response? “I did.”

White tried to push back that being in charge of the company protected him from any recompence, but the hosts were not having it. Jess Hilarious pointed out that he specifically, publicly announced that he would not be stepping away from the UFC after this occurred.

“There’s a board of directors, there’s other people that are involved [in the decision-making process] that could have pushed for [his removal], but I think, and obviously they think too, it would have hurt the company more if I did step away,” White expressed.

When challenged that he had disciplined fighters in the past for their comments or conduct, he claimed he was far less harsh than another sports leagues would be to those who violated code of conduct policies. Of note, Miguel Torres was for making a reference to a crude joke in the television show “Workaholics,” was for his statements about transgender fighter and was also for his words on Twitter in the past.