Audie Cornish
00:00:01
Full disclosure, I've never taken a hit.
Jorge Masvidal
00:00:04
Just like that again. I know. Are you sure? Both.
Audie Cornish
00:00:07
So this episode of the assignment starts with a lesson.
Jorge Masvidal
00:00:11
Your whole chest faces down. Shoulders. There you go. Keep your eyes open.
Audie Cornish
00:00:15
'Perfect. I'm in Coconut Creek in Broward County, Florida, at American Top team. It's a well-known mixed martial arts academy. God. And this isn't just any instructor. This is Ultimate Fighting championship legend, George Mask Fidel.
Jorge Masvidal
00:00:34
Believe me, you're going to put somebody to sleep.
Audie Cornish
00:00:36
Put somebody to sleep! I'm scared
Audie Cornish
00:00:41
Fighters like Masvidal have proven the loudest and most ardent Trump supporters in pro sports. And they bring with them a vast audience of young men, the kind of voters who have been peeling off from the Democratic Party the last few years. On today's show, we talk about why that is. What, if anything, Democrats can do about it. And how the UFC has become a key part of a broader Trump campaign strategy to turn out disaffected young men looking for a political home. I'm Audie Cornish. And this is The Assignment.
CNN
00:01:22
Ok, everyone good? This is Audie Cornish interviewing head to head Mastodon for the assignment on the road.
Audie Cornish
00:01:26
'We sat down in the center of his private training ring. It's actually an octagon. But either way, we were barefoot gym rules. Masvidal has a new memoir out this fall called Born to Fight: How a Street Fighter Living on the Edge Became Gamebred and Found Success. Now, at the moment, he doesn't much look like the ferocious brawler on that book cover. But I catch glimmers of his fighting persona here and there. Like he leans into the microphone to make a point the way they do at pre-fight press conferences.
Jorge Masvidal
00:01:57
So if I'm in competition, they're going to introduce me, "Jorge Gamebred Masvidal."
Audie Cornish
00:02:05
Masvidal was born in Miami, but like many Latino voters in the state, he's deeply influenced by his family's story of fleeing Cuba to escape Castro's communist regime. He's rallied with Latinos for Trump and fighters Against Socialism and praised the former president after his last fight when he retired from the UFC last year. Masvidal's activism gets mixed reviews.
Jorge Masvidal
00:02:29
Yeah, I could show you my Instagram right now. You wouldn't believe it. You know, there's a lot of lying people who call me a traitor. Why are you writing with Trump for this? And now you're not allowing for real? Are you freaking out or sell out? Listen, I like no man. You're the one that doesn't understand what's happening here. And there's communism on the other side, and we've got to stand up against it, you know?
Audie Cornish
00:02:48
So how he reached this point is important. It's his personal story that made me want to talk to him about the young men who have drifted to Trump. When you were a kid, were you much of a fighter?
Jorge Masvidal
00:03:01
Always. Naturally. So I don't one thing I was naturally, you know, just in my blood. Very, very natural.
Audie Cornish
00:03:07
Because you grew up in a couple of places. You grew up in Miami at a certain point. And then at one point your mom brings you to Peru to have that right to live with her parents. And when that happens, the kid you describe then is small, is quiet. He's different. Yeah, he's little and he's different from who I'm looking at now.
Jorge Masvidal
00:03:27
Yeah. Very little. Very shy, very introverted. I didn't talk to anybody at that time. Back then. I would just very much keep to myself. I had been moving around a lot, so I just I just kept to myself. And in that I would be able to talk to myself a lot and figure like things out or, or like try to make sense of things, you know? So I as I was growing up, I was very not, not like this, like I wouldn't engage in conversations ever. I'd always keep to myself, you know.
Audie Cornish
00:03:56
You and.
Jorge Masvidal
00:03:57
very introverted
Audie Cornish
00:03:57
Yeah, but you like tell that you said talk to yourself and you tell this story of being a kid and at one point telling yourself to not cry anymore.
Jorge Masvidal
00:04:05
Yeah. Yeah.
Audie Cornish
00:04:06
So just so people understand this, your mom has left you in Peru so that she can work, right? Which is very common. My family's from Jamaica. Like, people routinely would go work right and kids get left behind with relatives. But you're hurting. Your dad's not there. Your grandparents are lovely, but you're hurting. Yeah. Tell me about that. What happened that led up to your tears and then this conversation you could be having with yourself?
Jorge Masvidal
00:04:35
I remember just being in a different country and, you know, not not everything was out of it had been we had been moving around in Miami numerous places for like the Latin in the last year. For one reason or another. We had moved to like 3 or 4 different places. So I didn't really have like a place where I was like, this is home, you know. Now I was in another country getting me acquainted with that when my mom was in this. I just remember it was like a tough day like that. I didn't have like the best thing in school. I still didn't have, like, a routine. So I. I felt in every way she possible, like at a place. And I remember I just started crying because I miss my mom. But I had a really quite enough had been like numerous days in a row and it hadn't got me anywhere to cry. So I said to myself and obviously I, I did it for a long time, but not forever. Said I'm never going to cry again, you know? And I went up like,.
Audie Cornish
00:05:21
How old are you?
Jorge Masvidal
00:05:22
I was young, honestly. I was about six years old.
Audie Cornish
00:05:24
Okay, that is crazy. So you're never going to cry.
Jorge Masvidal
00:05:27
Again at 6 or 8, you know?
Audie Cornish
00:05:29
But do you know that it says something about what you thought would get you through?
Jorge Masvidal
00:05:33
Yes, exactly. And, you know, it did get me through for for a large part, because then I, I started in my mind, started to work a little differently. Well, if I keep thinking about the things that make me sad, I'm going to keep being sad. So I started being just more of a kid and just playing sports or going outside or watching the TV. And I kind of started like just forgetting about the situation. And that helped me in turn to like, go ahead. I don't know if that was the right thing to do.
Audie Cornish
00:06:00
Yeah. How long was it before you really cried again?
Jorge Masvidal
00:06:03
I remember it was a while. I want to say, maybe I was in my teen years or something like that because I was stuck with me for a while and then stung, you know, for being, you know. Yeah.
Audie Cornish
00:06:13
That's a long time. So you're a young person when you start wanting to be a fighter, right? How old are you when you start thinking fighting could be not a way of life, but, you know, we're raising the age of the Internet. We start to see fights online. And I'm wondering, how old are you were before you were kind of introduced to it conceptually?
Jorge Masvidal
00:06:37
Well, the first time I saw it, I was around 12 years old. And nothing in life to that moment had like captivated me and said, there's one other thing. Boxing, which I had seen when I was first very young, and I was like, that's cool. And then I saw it again when I was like seven, eight years old. And I remember just like, like how, you know, a kid inspired to play basketball sees basketball for the first time ever, I was just captivated. There's like nothing else exists in that room. And when I saw that, you see, it was like that for me.
Audie Cornish
00:07:06
So one of the things that's interesting is you grew up right? We talked about you growing up in Miami, being in Peru, but you also grew up with family who sat around the table and talked about politics a lot. Yeah, mine too. And when you were growing up, you describe it as sounding like I'm kind of complaining, right? Because they're talking about Castro. They're talking about Cuba. What are the kinds of things they talked about? Because I kind of want to understand what the politics of your home were like.
Jorge Masvidal
00:07:38
A lot in the beginning, I remember something that always come to mind was division. They would always talk about division.
Audie Cornish
00:07:44
And are these uncles, aunts, like, who? Set the scene for me.
Jorge Masvidal
00:07:47
Man. So it could be real interesting ones because my family on Sundays sometimes would be a big mess of them. You know, 20 of them, 15 of them. 100% of them were against communism. But some of them, because of, you know, survival of the fittest and things like that, did work with the government, though. They hated it and always denouncing them and when they got here said, hey, I just did that for survival. That is like the worst type of human crimes you commit to a person, you put them under communism.
Audie Cornish
00:08:14
Sunday dinner is people having very different experiences with the government.
Jorge Masvidal
00:08:19
Different experiences, but all the same outcome. Communism is a worst thing that happened to humans. Socialism is a worse thing to happen. If this ever comes to this country, the world is gone. If there's ever communism in this country running this country, the whole world will collapse. And as a kid, I'm hearing these things and I'm like, I'm going to deal with your home. You know, I'm like seven, eight, nine years old, ten years old, like starting to understand more, but not really. Now it doesn't really, politics don't really start to hit me and I don't really start to dive into a deep and understand these conversations till I get older. And I knew the story since I was young. But as I got older, I wanted to know is this true? And my dad escaped Cuba on a raft. He got a tire tractor. He got the inner linings of it. They made it into a raft. Him, his best friend, his best friend's uncle. And they took off and landed in the Bahamas seven days later. From there, they.
Audie Cornish
00:09:08
What years were, was this around?
Jorge Masvidal
00:09:10
This was in the 70s, like late 70s. So like I was saying, my dad escaped. And that's what made me really, really like what was happening in Cuba. .
Audie Cornish
00:09:21
Why would he make a raft?
Jorge Masvidal
00:09:22
Why did you do it? And this is when I got a little bit older and I asked my other family members like you that escaped, you thought it was a joke. And I was I don't know if I maybe you guys exaggerated saying no. Yeah, he escaped when he was 14. And that was crazy. He wasn't going out like that and he left. And at first when I was young and I used to ask the question, they'd be like, Well, simple. They're not even going to let you pick your favorite color. They're going to tell you what your favorite color is. And that's you're going to have to do. And that was like my answer when I was like eight, nine years old. And I was like.
Audie Cornish
00:09:46
That was their way of explaining it. So like, government control would be dictating your decisions on.
Jorge Masvidal
00:09:53
Exactly. And then as I got a little older, they understood. I understood it like perfectly, you know, And I just said, Hey, whatever it is that you guys feel so much, I don't like it either. Just if you ever see me, tell me. So in this, politics are happening and things are going on. My dad, my aunts, my uncles would point out things that are straight out of a communist playbook. And I go, Well, why? And they go well let me explain to you. And I go, okay, interesting.
Audie Cornish
00:10:19
So as they're encountering the modern day politics of the U.S., reading the papers, seeing the news, they are, in a way giving you little footnotes. They're saying, hey. So as you're growing up, your family, they're pointing these things out to you. You're fighting career is growing. But what was it that made you connect with Donald Trump in particular or that particular brand of politics, which I think is different from Republican establishment, that even like the Bush family, Right. Jeb Bush had a long history in Florida, but you gravitated towards a very specific wing of the Republican Party when that is bubbling up, 2015, 2016, what is drawing you to it? And the reason why I ask is more and more young men without college degrees are also being drawn to it. And I'm sort of curious what connected it for you.
Jorge Masvidal
00:11:12
So like I told you, I had the huge influence from my family with the politics. So I'm looking at politicians and not not necessarily how just an American would look at them. But somebody has lived these experiences and has had these experiences. So I'm is I'm hearing these politicians. I'm kind of like, man. Every single one of them is foolish. Like all of them, they all promise this, this, this and this. Then they get there and they don't deliver on anything. Not Democrats, not Republicans. You come to this guy. Trump Right. And he's talking about I was in all of these guys pockets. They were never in my I had these politicians doing my bidding, my will and I would fund their campaigns. I'm telling you, no one's going to be my package. I'm running the show. What I say is what I'm going to do.
Audie Cornish
00:12:00
So, you know, I hear that and think like, these corrupt. You think like, this means he's going to
Jorge Masvidal
00:12:06
He's going to have his own thoughts and ideas instead of corporations telling him, here, do this. As is what we see in politics, you know, how is it that certain politicians, their salaries are dictate $160,000 a year and they have $100 million net worth. Because he's coming in with money already. What does he have to gain? Or it he I much would trust somebody that has $1 billion in business that you've already made than somebody that's money hungry and it has constant money in front of them and they can't control themselves. You know, when I heard him say that, I was like, this guy's going to actually do it. And, you know, before he went for politics, I was kind of a fan already. You know, I had seen documents. I read the book just because of his negotiation tactics. I was like, interesting to see. So when I saw that he was going to put his heart and soul into politics and actually fight for America, it was like the best thing ever. And then to see that he kept a good amount of his promises and things that he, you know, like if he was a prophet, he predicted like, hey, we're going to have a border problem if we don't put this border up. Now we have 20 million illegal immigrants. Now the economy's like doing so bad. And I know they'll keep blaming and biting the current administration on on Trump like, he he handed us over a messed up economy. I don't know about you, but I was a lot way better off than those four years with Trump than anything, you know, and.
Audie Cornish
00:13:24
That that is the Trump argument and J.D. Vance, and that is what they talk about on the campaign trail. Do you think that there is something about the way they talk about issues that, for other young men who are in the place you were, that is going to make them actually turn out? What's different this year?
Jorge Masvidal
00:13:49
What's different this year is that hardworking men like myself, you know, there's a lot of us, there's a lot of men that are just, we're wired when we wake up early and we're going to get to work, we're going to find a job to provide for our families, for our families back home, whatever it is the case, we're going to provide for them. And we have this you know, we're going to work 12 hour, 14 hour shifts every day, you know, and then at the end of the week, I'm going to kind of see how much money I got. Doesn't take a rocket scientist, these same hardworking dogs. I'm going to be like, no matter how many hours I put in now, I'm still coming up considerably short. Things are considerably more expensive. I cannot even afford a one bedroom for me, my wife, my kid and my mother. I don't understand. What am I doing wrong? I'm working more hours than I was five years ago like crazy amount more. I have more side businesses. I'm doing more things on the side and I still can't make ends meet. I still can't get a loan at a decent rate. I still can't finance a car for for my mother or whatever it is. These are real life things, you know. Then you go to the grocery store and and say everything is so much more expensive. It's crazy. Then you see you're going to get a break at the gas pump. No, you're not. You know. And then the administration currently running for presidency is the second most powerful person in the country and can do anything for us.
Audie Cornish
00:15:07
What is it that you think because Trump has really bonded with the UFC, right? Like holding events, going to events, being on the podcast, talking very highly about people like you. And a lot of people look to that as the way he is making inroads with young men in this space and in other spaces that he's being where they are. And I wonder if you see that as well, him doing something that Democrats aren't doing in coming to the UFC and getting in the ring, so to speak.
Jorge Masvidal
00:15:40
I think Democrats do a lot of other things. They have football and basketball. They have a lot of other sports that the Democratic influence is strongly, strongly there. You know, and so.
Audie Cornish
00:15:49
You're saying even if you don't see a candidate there. Yeah, they do it.
Jorge Masvidal
00:15:52
Yeah, because.
Audie Cornish
00:15:53
The politics of other sports feels different.
Jorge Masvidal
00:15:55
Of course. Yeah. LeBron James is super Democratic, so they don't have a person in place, but they have one of the biggest influencers, possibly, an influential basketball player that has a lot of influence in the world.
Audie Cornish
00:16:07
What's he difference between you and LeBron James? Because I mean Leron James, he has his own political background, right, that he grew up with and has reached his own conclusions as a voting adult. How is that different from you?
Jorge Masvidal
00:16:19
There's there's nobody telling me what to do. People tell LeBron what to do, like Nike.
Audie Cornish
00:16:23
He's literally King James. I think he's fine.
Jorge Masvidal
00:16:26
He can't say certain things that might hurt his career. He can't talk bad about China paying kids nothing to make shoes. You can't say that. You'd say that.
Audie Cornish
00:16:35
But you're saying in the UFC
Jorge Masvidal
00:16:36
I could say that.
Audie Cornish
00:16:36
You can say whatever.
Jorge Masvidal
00:16:37
In the UFC, we could say whatever. And I'm not going to get fined. Dana's not going to give me a call saying, Stop talking about Jesus every time you win. That's not going to happen. We're a completely different thing. We're not we don't have a union like basketball. So many different layers mean LeBron had nowhere near the same freedom of speech. I could really go nuts and nothing's going to happen to me. He'll get censured right away. So I don't think he gives his full best opinion because there's nobody is thinking we're unsafe. This country is all the money issues and we just talked about.
Audie Cornish
00:17:04
This freedom of expression issue is fascinating because that is another thing that the right and conservatives and Trump talk about. Right. And even DeSantis here in Florida talking about whatever anti wokeness. It's the idea that like you feel like you have a stronger ability to express yourself in any way you want for the political party you're in. Yeah.
Jorge Masvidal
00:17:28
I might lose fans or sponsors for me. Yeah, but I'm not, I'm not going to. You know, my life is not going to change in which I could care less. You know, I'm going to say what's on my mind and on my heart. And a lot of these football players, basketball players can't do that. They're part of a union and part of this this whole other movement, you know, they can't be talking wild like that.
Audie Cornish
00:17:49
I mean, in fairness, the UFC is actually fighting off an antitrust lawsuit, Right? I mean, the players have come forward to say this is a monopoly and we are at the rotten end of that. So it's not as though it's far away, right? People still look at what's.
Jorge Masvidal
00:18:03
The number one fight by far. But what I'm saying is that I could say whatever I want politically wise. I could say whatever I want about China. Competing against us when they literally have slaves are forcing people to work, where it's free will free market over here. I can say things like that. LeBron can't, you know, so I don't know how you want to slice it up and way, but my freedom of speech is a lot more free than any of these other guys. You know.
Audie Cornish
00:18:28
How do you think that. It feels like that probably is also something that would appeal to a certain kind of person, like a person who
Jorge Masvidal
00:18:35
A person who loves freedom. I think anybody who loves freedom. I think that's why mainly people that love fighting love Trump as well, because it just means freedom. You know, it's not that if you're fighting wildly, you know, you're going to want you can be a little bit more rambunctious. I don't want people telling me what to do. And I don't want people telling us during Corona that we can't go out and make money without talking.
Audie Cornish
00:18:56
About.
Jorge Masvidal
00:18:57
This. You know, that's crazy.
Audie Cornish
00:18:58
But Covid 19 virus, 19 virus.
Jorge Masvidal
00:19:01
I don't want, you know, all this, all this craziness, it doesn't let us be a fruitful society. You know, I don't think the Democrats have done anything for us these last four years.
Audie Cornish
00:19:11
So we want to talk about freedom. This is really important because it's become such a term that's going back and forth in this election. And Democrats, just to give you an example, they talk about being the party of freedom right now because they're talking about reproductive rights. Right. And the idea that certain freedoms were taken away in that instance, freedom from gun violence is another thing that they talk about. You hear them embracing that word. Do you think there are ways that Democrats could be appealing to the young man you once were? And is that the path to do it, that talk about freedom?
Jorge Masvidal
00:19:53
Yeah, but those freedoms you said right there, like, I'm not a woman, right? So it's like, you know, I don't, my opinion, there's kind of like, I don't know what to say in that area, you know, because from, from my standpoint, I'm not a woman. So I understand I shouldn't tell another woman what to do with her body. Right. But at the same time, it's like nobody should be telling me what to do with my body either. Do you agree?
Audie Cornish
00:20:16
Yeah. Who's telling you what to do with your body?
Jorge Masvidal
00:20:19
Everybody was telling me to get a vaccine, and if I didn't get a vaccine, I couldn't work here. I couldn't work there. I couldn't eat here. Couldn't eat there. So first time in history our rights got violated like that ever from from a medical standpoint.
Audie Cornish
00:20:30
So for you, there was a moment that you felt.
Jorge Masvidal
00:20:32
That's like another bad moment. And it was mainly Democrats pushing this thing on us. Like everybody has their specific needs and things. You might love, I don't know, cheesecake and I might be allergic to dairy. Right. So it's like, what the hell? You know, you can't just say this shot is for everybody and that's crazy. And our rights are getting violated there. So why is it that a woman can have her choice, which obviously, I believe that there's a baby killing the baby and it's not cool in any way, shape or form. But, you know, they say my body, my choice when I want it should be the same thing applied in all things. And Democrats hold like a lot of double standards. That's why me personally, I, I can't see myself or like young men rocking with the Democratic Party because it's a double standard for a lot of things. And that's just one example of many that I point out.
Audie Cornish
00:21:16
Why do you think there's a gender gap?
Jorge Masvidal
00:21:17
The gender gap in which way?
Audie Cornish
00:21:18
Meaning why do you think that more and more women are leaning towards Democrats and more men leaning towards Republicans?
Jorge Masvidal
00:21:25
I want to see those studies.
Audie Cornish
00:21:27
Because you talked about division. So, you know, there is.
Jorge Masvidal
00:21:29
No there's always division in the country. And lately, the Democrats, they feed off that. They thrive. They want to make black.
Audie Cornish
00:21:36
It's two to tango on division in this country. You know, don't you think? Do you really believe as a fighter, as someone who stands mano a mano, you know, with people it takes two to divide something sometimes.
Jorge Masvidal
00:21:50
But I'm telling you, this is a straight line. This is a straight line.
Audie Cornish
00:21:55
I will quote unquote, go out with you on this. I think that both parties have ways of speaking that can feel divisive. And I think that some of the trends in this country of divisions are not the fault of any one particular party.
Jorge Masvidal
00:22:13
I don't know. I think not.
Audie Cornish
00:22:16
Really.
Jorge Masvidal
00:22:16
Yeah, I think not. You know, I. I think that more and more, one party wants to celebrate it. You know, like, hey, the first brown governor, Latin governor. You have to come out and vote for him if you're Latin and if you don't vote for him, you're not Latin. It's like, wait up? Who are the two parties that say that? Biden. Biden has said things like that and numerous of them have said things like that to make it.
Audie Cornish
00:22:39
Like Trump has said the same thing about Jewish voters. If you don't vote for me. Or, you know.
Jorge Masvidal
00:22:44
I get it. But he's not Jewish and he's.
Audie Cornish
00:22:46
We're talking language. Division in language.
Jorge Masvidal
00:22:49
Yeah. But I don't know. It just feels like the Democrats hang on to it a lot. It's cause, like, hey, I'm the first, you know, immigrant person to hold this position. That's that's a cool moment in itself. But I'm not going to vote for you because you have the same skin color and you're the first brown person to run for this. Awesome. What does your freaking thing look like? What is your resumé look like? Are you ten times better than everybody here? Because I want to pick somebody that looks I mean those guys job not just because they have the same background as me or same last name as me. I want the most qualified individuals is and the Democrats run a lot on that ticket. And that is straight out of the playbook of communism. You know, divide the black people from within. The black people have the blacks hate the blacks. The whites hate the whites. Have everybody hate each other because then you could conquer when you divide. And that's straight out of the communist playbook, you know, and we see now more than ever that it's one party takes it very to the extreme. You know, one party is like you trade or use and then it we mean trading. You know, I'm doing what's best for me and my family.
Audie Cornish
00:23:48
What do you think would kind of close those divisions? What's your hope?
Jorge Masvidal
00:23:54
My my hope is that the country gets so good that the world that there's no more wars. For starters, you stop with this. Wars everywhere. We go and we get the right leader here, which is Trump that can bring world peace and world peace. Start to focus in America and just say, hey, we don't need this war. Brothers and sisters, you know, we're all made from one creator. You might have a different skin color. I have different eye colors, but we're all the same thing, you know, And I was fighting each other is not ever going to help us. It's only going to help them. And people that are in control. People have been destroying the world and the country. The top 1% world leaders stuff. They're not for you and me. They're for themselves. If you come from Miami and you live here, you don't feel that racism. That's why so many people come here. This city was built by immigrants as well, you know. But this is a place where we just want to succeed and stuff. And that's why people keep coming here. And I think the whole rest of the country, if you do the same thing like man, forget your background, forget where you came from. Let's just make this money, follow the rules of society, not do illegal things and all get along because the hatred is like the biggest cancer you can have, you know?
Audie Cornish
00:25:04
Well, Jorge Masvidal, thank you so much for talking to us about your book, Born to Fight.
Jorge Masvidal
00:25:09
Thank you so much.
Audie Cornish
00:25:10
It was wonderful hearing from you and hearing your story and how you've become who you are today. I really appreciate it.
Jorge Masvidal
00:25:18
Thank you so much.
Audie Cornish
00:25:20
'Professional boxer and mixed martial arts fighter George Moss Vidal. His new book is called Born to Fight. Coming up, how the UFC ended up at the Cross-section of Sports and Politics.
Luke Thomas
00:25:34
Somewhere along the line, the culture wars ate everything, including sports fandom to a degree, and especially in combat sports it had a highly influential effect.
Audie Cornish
00:25:46
Stay with us. The UFC is more than a haven for conservative voices in sports. Trump's relationship with it goes back to the early 2000s, when the most high profile and expensive arenas didn't exactly embrace the sport. He's close with the CEO, Dana White, and Trump campaign spokesman Stephen Cheung used to be the UFC's director of communications and public affairs. Combat sports analyst and podcaster Luke Thomas has watched the last few years as politics has made its way into the sport.
Luke Thomas
00:26:23
'I mean, one thing that should be noted is I've known Jorge for a very long time. I've interviewed him. And he was one of the first ones to really kind of lean into it, although he is hardly alone at this point. His now a rival but former friend Colby Covington, who also lives in South Florida, has done the exact same thing. And in fact, the gym at which George is a part of, which is, by the way, it's no insignificant gym. It's called American Top Team. It's in Coconut Creek, Florida. They held a rally for Ron DeSantis when he was running for reelection in Florida. There was something of a reluctance among Trump supporters, maybe circa 2016. They didn't necessarily make it a forward part of their identity, even if they expressed certain degrees of sympathy about it. Right. They might have like snuck in a line here or there about their political leanings. But somewhere along the line, it became the leading part of a public identity, a leading part of how they want to introduce themselves to the world and make it known. And part of that is transactional. It's a good way to get attention, obviously, and promote various causes. But there was something of a switch and I think it happened post-pandemic somewhere along the lines, somewhere some more during the Biden administration in terms of like why this is sort of a place that has become a hub for right wing politics. I mean, I would explain it this way. The self-selection of who ends up in these places highly skews towards right wing or people, I should say, with right wing views. This is something that is undeniable and I don't really have a good explanation for that, except a lot of folks with those views are probably attracted to hyper masculine things, although I am as well. I think there's also something of like a Horatio Alger story that kind of self-empowerment mastery of self up from the bootstraps. I can control my destiny. I can become something quite special. And I believe in the power of myself to do things. Which by itself sounds like something quite neutral.
Audie Cornish
00:28:07
But we also know when we think about ideology, there's so much about the way Democrats think these days that is about collectivism, right. And the community. And for Republicans, there is much more of an emphasis on the individual. And it feels like in an election that certainly Republicans and specifically the Trump campaign want it to be about strength versus weakness. This is the right area to target, right? Like a bunch of people who are, might be sympathetic to your view of the world, but who don't always turn out.
Luke Thomas
00:28:41
That's right. And also, most of these people that would hold these views or live in this world, they just don't have any relationship to the left in any capacity either. Left organizations, the Democratic Party, nothing like there's no relationship to them whatsoever. They just find a political ideology that's just more in keeping with their general worldview. Like if you just go to an MMA event, you will see right wing influencers, you will see right wing political podcasters, you will see people in that world outside of MMA doing their best to enmesh themselves. And you simply don't see any of that from folks on the left. It is not at all a thing that you see. You might see a little bit of that in boxing, a little bit of that, but virtually none in MMA. And so there's just they're almost two divorced worlds. Somebody once asked me like, what could the Democratic Party do to recruit these folks? And like, the first thing is you got to know them.
Audie Cornish
00:29:37
Like, yeah, you gotta show up.
Luke Thomas
00:29:39
Like just tossing out policies to them is like, they don't. There's profound distrust of them. You have to bridge that gap first.
Audie Cornish
00:29:48
Can you talk a little more about this bridging of the gap? Are there Democrats, progressives, are there figures you think could work in this space because there's this hope that Tim Walz. Right. Coach, is his background and that somehow that's something that speaks to a kind of toughness, a certain masculinity that might appeal to someone, the hunter, right. The hunting hats they have for him. And it feels like a slight acknowledgment for liberals, for progressives that like, yeah, we're not doing much here right, as a community to try and reach out.
Luke Thomas
00:30:26
I definitely feel like it's possible. I really do believe that, like, I generally think that there is a vision that could work. Tim Walz is too old, I think, to have an impact on the kind of group we're talking about. But I do believe that ultimately what you're getting at, which is showing another way to get to these kinds of masculine ideals, can work, but someone a lot more capable than me is going to have to figure out how you get around these minefields.
Audie Cornish
00:30:51
You're pretty capable. You're very capable. I mean, for example, I listened to your video where you directly addressed you said young men, the things you may believe about women, things that, I mean, you didn't use the word misogyny, but like, that's what I was hearing you get at. You said these are lies. These are B.S. these are things I've succumbed to myself in the past. You have this very direct way of doing it. And I thought if I was a guy who wanted to be you, right. Who looked at you and saw the marine background, that MMA background, the writing like, it would be meaningful. And I guess what I'm wondering is like, yeah, is there a world where there are more of you? Or is there just a different way to present masculinity to young men so that they don't necessarily feel locked out of the culture?
Luke Thomas
00:31:44
'Yeah, for sure there is. But I mean, let's just be clear about something like your credentials almost to a degree don't matter. I mean, you could be a Navy Seal if you're a Navy Seal and you're like super pro, I mean, obvious he's out of the race now, but super pro-Biden, they'll just dismiss it. Like there's a group that will just simply dismiss it. But like, for example, though, I'm glad you brought up this particular issue, the one on treatment of women. I actually do think you could reach a lot of guys this way. That is one issue where I feel like a significant amount of positive ground could be made. And the reason why I believe that is because I'm living proof of it. I grew up with a very complicated relationship with my mother. And, you know,
Audie Cornish
00:32:19
You talked about her being abusive.
Luke Thomas
00:32:20
I mean, I love my mother. She she has passed away. But that was a big part of my life that I got hit a lot, like a lot. And, you know, there's a ton of men online, particularly within a demographic who watch combat sports, who have some kind of bad messages that they get or lack of understanding or disillusioning background. And to the extent that I on that particular issue, that I can provide a roadmap that one, I am very willing to go to the mat on because I have lived it. I have lived out the worthlessness of trying to find some kind of truth in misogyny. And it's just there's nothing to it. It's all a series of lies that there's it's totally empty. I think you can win on that issue. I fundamentally believe that.
Audie Cornish
00:32:59
We talked about the struggles for Democrats, the left, to make inroads, right, with this particular community. When you look at what Trump has been able to achieve, particularly with his relationship with the UFC, can you talk about how strong that is and what's notable about the way he did it?
Luke Thomas
00:33:20
Yeah, so listen right up front like. There's nothing about Donald Trump that I like. Nothing.
Audie Cornish
00:33:29
I appreciate that disclosure as a journalist.
Luke Thomas
00:33:30
I mean, I want to be very clear about this. He is not my guy at all. However, there is one thing that if you're going to understand him, you have to reckon with the truth a little bit, which is he's a real fight fan or at a bare minimum, he is an old timer in the game. And what I mean by that is like folks see his relationship to the UFC now and they think this is like a turn he made. No, guys, go back and look at when Evander Holyfield, at age 28, fought a 42 year old George Foreman in Trump Plaza in Atlantic City. He paid $12 million at the time for that fight for the rights to host it. This is a guy who has been enmeshed in the circus, but also the power of the fight game longer than most UFC fans have been alive.
Audie Cornish
00:34:13
The promotion of it, right.
Luke Thomas
00:34:17
The promotion. What it can do for you. I mean, at the time, I think he was looking for, you know, New York celebrity status, not so much political ambition, but he's been doing this for the longest amount of time. This more recent turn comes from, I think, you know, just a bit of an opportunity because he obviously folks might know in 2001, he let the UFC when they were in a very troubled state, hosted a couple of events at one of his facilities, and they have since maintained a relationship.
Audie Cornish
00:34:41
But understanding that this is the popular fighting sport of the day, right? Like whereas back in the 70s, 80s, early 90s, the stars would align right for a lot of boxing like at more levels. And I feel like for this generation it's MMA, for this generation it is these combat sports.
Luke Thomas
00:35:01
Part of it is the energy. Part of it is the relationship with Dana White. Part of it is the UFC has a monopoly in their industry, whereas there is no monopolist currently in boxing. And so it's a great way to get a concentrated look at an important demographic. But I think all of those things in concert work together about why he ultimately chose this direction.
Audie Cornish
00:35:18
What do they get out of it? A relationship with Trump.
Luke Thomas
00:35:21
Quite a bit, actually. I think the number one, there is obviously an ideological alignment. There is an ideological overlap. But to me you're asking what the value is. The value is that if Trump is in office, they are going to likely inherit a far more favorable regulatory climate for their interests. They're currently facing an antitrust lawsuit. We don't know if they'll reach a settlement. We don't know if they'll go to trial. Trial is scheduled for four months from now. This is a massive, massive thing.
Audie Cornish
00:35:48
And regardless of that, the reason why they're facing these legal repercussions is because they have arguably a monopoly. Right. The sport is run by one company. Athletes have pushed back on that. They've complained about their contracts, their treatment. And we know that the Biden administration does have a more kind of aggressive regulatory posture towards monopolies. Like Google is facing this. Lots of places are facing this idea that, like, if you stick with the people in place, if you stick with this Democratic administration, you will still be dealing with these people who are going after monopolies.
Luke Thomas
00:36:29
There is simply no question in my mind that that is an absolutely huge motivating factor here. I think that is a key component of the whole entire thing.
Audie Cornish
00:36:38
Well, Luke Thomas, thank you so much for venturing with me in this conversation and I really appreciated your perspective.
Luke Thomas
00:36:47
I appreciate the conversation. Thank you for having me.
Audie Cornish
00:36:50
Sports analyst Luke Thomas. His podcast is called Morning Combat. The assignment is a production of CNN Audio. And if you liked this episode, please hit the follow button. If you loved it, please share it. You can find the full video of this show in our show notes. This episode was produced by Jesse Remedios, Graelyn Brashear, Osman Noor and Dan Bloom. Our senior producer is Matt Martinez and the executive producer of CNN Audio is Steve Lickteig. Our video team on the road this week, Carlos Martinelli, Gerry Simonsson, and our technical director, Dan de Zula. We had support from Haley Thomas, Alex Mann, Asari, Robert Mathers, John Diadora, Lenny Steinhart and James Andrus, Nicole Pass through, as well as Lisa Navarro. Special thanks as always to Katie Henneman. I'm Audie Cornish. And thank you for listening.
