HISTORY VS. HERESY

Ratings-Obsessed Trump’s 80th Birthday Party Trounced by Knicks’ Big Win

One event honored athletic achievement, the other celebrated political theater. The audience vote was decisive.

opinion

The hyper-hyped $60 million UFC Freedom 250 event at the White House drew half as many viewers as the last game of the NBA Finals.

Paramount+ says it recorded 7 million viewers for the White House spectacle, with an estimated audience of 17 million across the U.S. and Latin America tuning in for the MMA fights that it presented as a dual celebration of the country’s 250th anniversary and President Donald Trump’s 80th birthday.

That is nearly half of the 33 million fans who watched on ABC as the New York Knicks beat the San Antonio Spurs for their first NBA Championship in 53 years.

The basketball game was history in the making, culminating in the dramatic final moments, when the Knicks won 94-90. The continuing excitement on Thursday morning had 2 million people cheering the Knicks at a ticker-tape parade down the Canyon of Heroes in Lower Manhattan.

The White House event was more heresy in the making, with Marines in dress uniforms saluting fighters who then battered each other in an octagon erected on the South Lawn. A film crew livestreamed a fighter proceeding directly from the Oval Office to the (maybe) temporary MMA cage, where he beat his opponent bloody.

The event ended with Trump, 80, and his family standing on the gore-spattered canvas alongside his close buddy, UFC CEO Dana White.

To be fair to the ratings-challenged Trump, the UFC White House event was not broadcast by a network. The audience was restricted to Paramount+ subscribers, who total about 79 million worldwide. In August 2025, the streaming service paid $7.7 billion for UFC media rights for the next seven years.

But if the event was truly as historic as it was billed, $8.99 a month should not have stopped any real patriot from subscribing. (There is even a summer sale currently underway, where it costs just 99 cents a month.)

The Knicks’ appeal was so strong that even Trump traveled to Madison Square Garden to watch Game 3 of the NBA Finals.

The arena filled with boos when the president appeared on video screens during the singing of the national anthem. Trump then sat down in a bulletproof booth and appeared to doze off beside another good buddy, James Dolan, owner of the Garden and the Knicks. That night, the team suffered its only defeat in the series.

Play Video

After the big victory, Dolan said on WFAN New York that Trump had asked the team to visit him at the Oval Office.

“We just did receive an invitation from the White House, which we accepted,” Dolan said. “We still have to figure out the details, etc. But yes, of course. Look, I invited the president to come down for [Game 3]. He is a friend. I’ve known him for 30 years, and I’m very proud to bring the team to the White House.”

Whether the team will actually go remains unclear, and it could become an issue. What is certain is that history in the making is a much bigger draw than heresy in action.

Go Knicks!

See more of our coverage in your search results.

ADD THE DAILY BEAST ON GOOGLE

Michael DalySpecial Correspondent

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here.