Matt Bevan

The UFC was a multibillion dollar brand and Donald Trump was not in vogue.

Following the attack on the Capitol building on January 6, 2021, and his departure from the White House two weeks later, Donald Trump kind of disappeared from public view for a little while.

In terms of public support, he was at an all-time low.

Less than 40% of Americans had a favourable opinion of him.

He spent months in the wilderness, out of office and locked out of his favourite social media networks, Twitter and Facebook.

Joe Rogan, who by this stage had been promoted from being the UFC's sideline reporter to being its chief commentator, talked on his podcast that Joe Rogan experienced about the importance of an investigation into the Capitol riot.

but people were also just generally losing interest in Donald Trump.

The number of people searching his name on Google collapsed.

His phone stopped ringing.

Apart from an appearance at a conservative political conference surrounded by die-hard fans, he fell out of the spotlight.

It's hard to fathom now, but for the first six months of 2021, Donald Trump just kept a really quite a low profile.

But then in July, UFC President Dana White said something during a podcast interview with former UFC fighter Mike Swick.

Trump is coming.

Oh, cool.

Trump is coming.

White said that Trump would be sitting with him ringside rather than in a private box.

On the day of the fight, Dana White and Donald Trump entered side by side.

There were some cheers, some boos, some USA chants.

Dana White told TMZ that he was thrilled.

Joe Rogan, who just a month earlier had been talking about how dangerous Trump was, now talked about how excited he was to meet the former president during the event.