A federal judge in Washington on Friday denied a last-minute bid to halt the upcoming UFC fight at the White House, ruling that the plaintiffs in the case failed to show they’d be harmed by the event going forward as planned.
In a 15-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta ruled that a local activist and Vietnam veteran who sued to block the event were unlikely to succeed in showing they had standing to bring the case. Nor did they appear likely to show that the temporary changes to the White House and Lincoln Memorial for the pre-fight ceremonies and Sunday’s main event would affect them personally, the judge ruled.
The plaintiffs are represented by the Public Integrity Project, which filed the lawsuit a little more than a week before the fight. The complaint argues that the construction of the 154-foot-wide arena on the South Lawn and planned pre-fight ceremonies at the White House grounds and Lincoln Memorial violate federal regulations on national parklands.
The suit also contends that President Donald Trump and UFC president Dana White stood to benefit financially from what it called the “deeply corrupt,” for-profit event. The lawsuit named the National Park Service and Interior Department as defendants.
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Lawyers for the plaintiffs sought an emergency order from the court barring construction of the arena — dubbed “the claw” — and other structures, saying they were “destroying” the South Lawn. The cost of repairs could reach an estimated $700,000.
The plaintiffs said the work had not received the required environmental reviews or congressional authorization. They also pointed to park service rules prohibiting sporting events from being held on the South Lawn and at the Lincoln Memorial.
The judge said the plaintiffs’ “unreasonable delay” in filing the lawsuit “undercuts their claims of irreparable harm.”
He also said the risk of significant environmental damage as a consequence of the arena construction was remote.
“On the other side of the ledger, a grant of emergency relief on the eve of UFC Freedom 250 would cause substantial harm to other interests,” Mehta wrote, noting the months of planning and tens of millions of dollars in spending on the event.
“The potential loss of those dollars resulting from a last-minute, court-ordered stoppage cannot be ignored,” he wrote.
A lawyer for the plaintiffs said Friday afternoon they accepted the judge’s decision.
“This isn’t a case about a sporting event, it’s about corruption, as a handful of people and companies stand to profit from our public monuments,” Brendan Ballou, CEO of the Public Integrity Project, said in an emailed statement. “While we’re disappointed in this decision, we of course respect it, and we’ll keep bringing cases to raise the cost of corruption in America.”
Government lawyers urged the court to let the event go on as planned, arguing that the plaintiffs had waited until the last minute to file their request when they could have done so months ago. Preparations have been underway for the better part of a year, and construction of “the claw” began in late May.
“Defendants and many third parties — the White House, the UFC, and ticketholders — have expended enormous time and vast resources for events starting in just days,” the government said in court papers. “A more starkly mismatched balance of harms would be difficult to conceive.”
Trump has floated the idea of keeping the claw, a 92-foot-tall structure, on the South Lawn after the event, comparing it to the Eiffel Tower. In court filings, the government rejected allegations that the event violated federal regulations, saying the rules didn’t apply to temporary fixtures.
The event, called UFC Freedom 250, is scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. on Sunday, following a news conference at the Lincoln Memorial on Friday and ceremonial weigh-ins on the White House’s Ellipse on Saturday. First proposed by Trump last year, the event is part of an array of festivities scheduled around the nation’s 250th anniversary celebrations, though separate from the congressionally sanctioned America 250 events. Sunday’s UFC fight also coincides with Trump’s 80th birthday.
Roughly 4,000 people are expected to watch the fights from the arena, and as many as 120,000 may view the event on screens on the Ellipse.
This story was updated to include a comment from the plaintiffs’ attorney.
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