A press secretary's task is to speak for the administration daily and credibly; a vacancy filled by public improvisation, then withdrawn within a day, leaves the podium without a settled voice.
US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he was only joking when he floated appointing Ultimate Fighting Championship chief Dana White as White House press secretary, according to TRT World. Speaking to reporters in West Palm Beach, Florida, Trump said he was "only kidding" about the appointment, though he indicated that White was enthusiastic about the idea. He said he planned to speak with White on Monday about other matters.
The clarification followed a public offer made a day earlier. On Saturday, Trump announced on his Truth Social platform that he had offered the job to White, a longtime friend and political supporter. In the post he called White a "violent Fighter and Warrior" and suggested that several UFC fighters could serve as his assistants at the White House. White, who was in London for a boxing event on Saturday, subsequently told reporters he planned to meet Trump at the White House on Monday, without explicitly confirming whether he was considering the position. He also shared Trump's announcement on Instagram alongside an image of himself behind the press briefing room podium.
The episode lands in the middle of a wider reshuffle. According to the report, the exchange comes amid a broader shake-up in the Trump administration following Republican losses in Tuesday's midterm elections, which saw Democrats win control of both chambers of Congress. On Friday, Trump announced that Stephen Miller would replace Susie Wiles as White House chief of staff. The press secretary's post has remained vacant since Katie Zacharia left the role after just five days, following the departure of Karoline Leavitt in August.
That sequence matters more than the joke itself. A press secretary's task is to speak for the administration daily and credibly; a vacancy filled by public improvisation, then withdrawn within a day, leaves the podium without a settled voice at a moment when the White House faces a Congress controlled by the opposition. The report does not say who else is under consideration, whether White was ever formally offered the role in writing, or how the administration intends to fill the position. Nor is it clear what Trump and White will discuss on Monday.
White's profile explains the speculation. He has been a prominent Trump supporter for years and appeared at several Republican National Conventions, and the two have attended UFC events together, including a June event at the White House marking the US' 250th anniversary. Whether the floated appointment was ever serious is not established; Trump's own account now is that it was not. What is confirmed is the pattern: a personnel announcement made on social media, amplified by the proposed appointee, and qualified a day later in front of reporters.
For an administration entering a period of divided government, the cost of that pattern is attention. Each improvised name crowds out the substantive appointments that will shape how the White House works with a Democratic Congress. The Miller appointment is the consequential one; the press secretary question remains open, and the report gives no indication of when, or with whom, it will be settled.
