Donald Trump and Joe Rogan were all smiles and handshakes at UFC 327, despite the podcaster having brutally criticized the president for months.
Trump arrived at the Kesaya Center in Miami for Saturday’s event, accompanied by Ultimate Fighting Championship CEO Dana White, and made a beeline for Rogan, who shook his hand firmly for several seconds.
After also greeting fellow MMA commentator Daniel Cormier, Trump grasped Rogan by the shoulder and patted his arm before moving away.
Rogan’s positive reaction to the president is at stark odds with his recent rhetoric. The podcaster, who hosted Trump on his successful show, is part of the group of “manosphere” influencers that helped him return to the White House.
However, Rogan has recently been much more critical of the president, especially about the ongoing war in Iran – which he has even suggested may have been started to distract Americans from the Epstein files scandal.
“Look, the Epstein files comes out — we go to war with Iran. It’s a good way to get people to stop talking about certain things,” Rogan said, during Wednesday’s episode of The Joe Rogan Experience.
“You give them a new problem to think about.”
Rogan has also suggested that Trump’s “Operation Epic Fury” campaign could drag the globe into World War III and warned that the president’s advanced age may lead to further reckless behavior because he “doesn’t have much to lose.”
“That’s spooky. That’s spooky. You’re making decisions for babies and children and the future of the world, and you’ve only got 10, maybe 10 years left on Earth if everything goes great,” Rogan said during his March 11 podcast.
Elsewhere, Rogan described himself as “politically homeless” while branding the MAGA movement as consisting of “f****** dorks.”
“A lot of them are these really weird, f****** uninteresting, unintelligent people that have got something they cling to and there’s a lot of people that are just real genuine patriots and they’re all lumped into this one group and you got to accept the dorks, too? F*** that!” he said in an episode last month.
