Al Sharpton went on national television and said something that even his allies at MSNBC probably wished he hadn’t.
The left-wing media have been hunting for ways to rain on America’s 250th birthday parade.
And Sharpton just handed critics a gift-wrapped soundbite they won’t let him forget anytime soon.
What Sharpton Actually Said
During a recent appearance on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Sharpton went after President Trump’s upcoming UFC Freedom 250 event at the White House — and the comparison he reached for was a jaw-dropping new low in race-baiting.
Morning Joe co-host Willie Geist had asked Sharpton how Americans should celebrate the country’s 250th anniversary, which Geist smeared as “a story full of horrors and racism and all those things, but also of triumph over some of those things.”
Sharpton’s answer took a hard left turn. After complaining about recent Republican redistricting wins, he pivoted to the White House fight night — and couldn’t even get the organization’s name right before unloading on it.
“Trump and others are trying to bring us back to an America that we struggle to get out of,” Sharpton said, stumbling over the UFC’s name before continuing.
“So there is a connection of why they’re having these fights on the on the White House lawn — the UFO, whatever they call it, UFC and all that — because they’re trying to go back to that when, you know, they’d watch people have these fights for the slave masters and they’d be entertained by that,” Sharpton said.
He kept going. Sharpton brought up Trump’s decision to hang a portrait of President Andrew Jackson in the Oval Office back in 2017, calling Jackson a “slave-owning” president who nominated Chief Justice Roger Taney — the judge who authored the Dred Scott decision.
“Why Jackson? That’s the kind of country he wants us to go back to — Andrew Jackson. And we must resist that with all we have,” Sharpton said.
Co-host Mika Brzezinski reportedly tried to steer the segment elsewhere by bringing up ICE raids, but Sharpton circled right back to the slavery comparison.
What the UFC White House Event Actually Is
UFC Freedom 250 is scheduled for June 14 — Flag Day and President Trump’s 80th birthday — on the South Lawn of the White House, as part of the America 250 celebration marking the nation’s semiquincentennial.
The main event features lightweight champion Ilia Topuria squaring off against two-time interim champion Justin Gaethje in a title unification bout. The full card is expected to include six primetime fights.
Construction crews have already broken ground on the South Lawn, building the signature UFC Octagon alongside risers and staging for thousands of attendees. The South Lawn arena will seat roughly 4,000 fans, while the Ellipse is expected to host a free fan fest where an estimated 75,000 to 100,000 people can watch on massive screens.
Trump announced the idea publicly at an Iowa rally in July 2025, saying, “We’re going to have a UFC fight on the grounds of the White House. We have a lot of land there. Dana’s going to do it.”
And Dana White confirmed the deal was done in August 2025, posting, “We had the meeting at the White House… The White House fight is on.”
The UFC is covering the full cost of the event, including an estimated $700,000 to restore the South Lawn afterward. No taxpayer money is being used. White told Time magazine, “This is basically me spending a sh-tload of money to celebrate the 250th birthday of America, with America and the rest of the world.”
Dana White Pushed Back — Hard
Sharpton’s slavery comparison came just days after UFC boss Dana White fired back at similar accusations during an interview with New Yorker editor David Remnick.
White rejected the racism charge against Trump outright, pointing to Trump’s decades-long friendship with Michael Jackson as evidence.
“The president had a very good relationship with Michael Jackson and had Michael Jackson around his kids all the time,” White said. “And you know, defended him when [accusations of sexual abuse were] going down. So to call the guy a racist is crazy.”
White also told Time that the UFC’s appeal to young men — the same demographic Trump has energized — grew out of a real cultural need. “During the COVID craziness and a lot of the stuff that went on, a lot of young men felt displaced and a lot of negative things were being said about young men,” White said. “This sport speaks to young men.”
The Bigger Picture Here
Sharpton’s comments weren’t just a rhetorical stumble. They fit a pattern that a lot of Americans find deeply offensive: the reflexive labeling of any cultural celebration involving Trump as racist.
Millions of UFC fans are Black, Latino, and Asian. The sport’s athletes come from every background imaginable. The idea that watching two elite fighters compete in mixed martial arts on the White House lawn is somehow a callback to antebellum slavery is the kind of claim that strains credulity.
But Sharpton has been playing this game for a long time, ever since the Tawana Brawley case. He knows the comparison generates attention. He knows it keeps him relevant. And he knows MSNBC will keep booking him regardless of how far the rhetoric flies.
What’s different now is that the country is in the middle of a genuine national celebration. America’s 250th birthday is a moment most people — left, right, and center — want to mark with some sense of pride. The UFC event has generated enormous enthusiasm. Trump told reporters recently, “I’ve been involved in a lot of big events; I have never had an event that has had more interest than the UFC fight we have right at the front door.”
And into that moment, Sharpton walked on national TV and compared it to slavery.
The redistricting battle Sharpton mentioned at the top of his rant is a real political fight worth having. Republicans have pursued aggressive map-drawing in multiple states, and Democrats are pushing back hard in the courts. That’s a legitimate debate.
But the leap from “Republicans are winning redistricting fights” to “therefore the UFC at the White House is like slaves fighting for their masters” — that’s not a political argument. That’s a man who has run out of things to say and is reaching for the most inflammatory comparison he can find.
Sharpton couldn’t even remember the name of the organization he was attacking. He called it “the UFO” before correcting himself. And yet he felt confident enough to compare it to one of the darkest chapters in American history.
The event is two weeks away. The fighters are training. The Octagon is going up on the South Lawn. Tens of thousands of Americans are going to show up on the National Mall to watch the fights on giant screens, free of charge, on their country’s 250th birthday.
Al Sharpton will probably be back on Morning Joe the following week, ready to compare whatever comes next to something equally unthinkable.
Sources: Mediaite; Breitbart; NewsBusters; Time; The Hill; Rolling Stone; Wikipedia/UFC Freedom 250; The Philadelphia Inquirer