President Trump will celebrate his 80th birthday Sunday with a night of UFC fights on the South Lawn of the White House.

It’s yet more proof that Trump is radically different from other presidents. And the spectacle carries risks as well as rewards, even as it plays into Trump’s love of showmanship and ardor for the spotlight.

First things first: Taxpayers are not on the hook for producing the event. The estimated staging cost of $60 million is being shouldered by UFC’s parent company, TKO Group Holdings.

This may not be enough to neutralize the risk that the event could backfire politically, however.

Vast swathes of the American population are struggling with rising costs and strained household budgets. A president celebrating his birthday in such a grandiose way as to draw comparisons with a Roman emperor at the Coliseum seems questionable to many.

“The optics are terrible, and it looks completely tone-deaf to the struggles of the American people,” said Todd Belt, a professor of political science who leads the political management program at the George Washington University.

Belt said that polling around the time of the 2024 election had indicated that “the number one issue that vaulted [Trump] into office was the economy. He has really taken his eye off the ball here.”

Democratic politicians have made similar points.

Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) linked the UFC event to another controversial project on the White House grounds: the construction of a new ballroom. 

“Trump is building a golden ballroom and for his birthday party — arranging a UFC fight on the White House grounds — while you’re fighting to pay this month’s bills. Could he be more out of touch?” Schiff wrote on social media last month.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) posted a photo of a vast lighting rig being set up on the South Lawn for the event. “It might be hard to see from this picture” but “Donald Trump is very focused on lowering costs,” she added sardonically.

There is, of course, a very different narrative about Sunday’s events put forth by the White House and outside Trump supporters.

White House spokesperson Davis Ingle told this column in an email that the night would be “one of the greatest and most historic sports events in history,” adding that Trump’s hosting of it was “testament to his vision to celebrate America’s monumental 250th anniversary.”

Ingle, who had been asked about the Schiff “out of touch” quote, also called the California Democrat “a complete disgrace.”

The broader pro-Trump argument is, in short, that UFC is a sport enjoyed by millions, that the sheer spectacle of the event is fun, and that Democrats and other liberal critics are overplaying their hands and risk coming across as elitist by looking down their noses.

Barry Bennett, who worked as a senior adviser to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, told this column he couldn’t see what all the fuss was about.

“If Donald Trump walked onto the South Lawn and announced that they had cured cancer, the Democrats would be against it,” Bennett argued. “It’s $60 million that UFC is paying — why does anyone care?  I don’t get it. There’s a huge section of the population that’s into it, and I don’t understand why anyone would be upset by it.”

Trump, meanwhile, has been talking about the White House event as if he were back in an earlier phase of his career, promoting boxing bouts at his Atlantic City casinos.

In a June 3 post on Truth Social, the president promised “one of the Most Entertaining Nights in American History.” 

He also mused that “nothing even close to this, the Greatest Fighters in the World, CHAMPIONS ALL, was even thought of for the People’s House!”

In making that point, Trump alluded to what he termed “fights of a much lower level [that] took place at the White House throughout its long and storied History.” He appeared to be pushing back at the criticism that Sunday’s UFC fight is an aberration.

Former President Theodore Roosevelt did indeed hold regular sparring sessions and invited fighters to the White House during his time. But this was not remotely on the scale of Sunday’s event. 

Democrats look askance at Republican arguments that there have been other White House happenings in the more recent past that have been similarly rooted in popular culture. 

“Come on, when was there another recent president who built a fight stage on the White House lawn?” Democratic strategist Mark Longabaugh said. “There is absolutely no legitimate comparison with Obama or Biden or George W. Bush hosting entertainers at the White House for some small concert inside.”

Longabaugh also raised another point, which first came to light through The New York Times’s sport-focused brand, The Athletic, in late May.

The Athletic noted that Trump’s May financial disclosures showed he had bought between $15,000 and $50,000 worth of TKO stock in advance of the White House event.

For Democrats like Longabaugh that’s ”a colossal conflict of interest.”

But the White House spokesperson quoted in the original story parried back that the media’s “continued attempts to fabricate conflicts of interest are irresponsible and reinforce the public’s distrust in what they read.”

Meanwhile, the UFC event is one more on a list of moves Trump has made that place himself front and center.

In addition to the construction of a ballroom, Trump is also pushing to erect a ceremonial arch that detractors have mocked as the “Arc de Trump.” 

Separately, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent acknowledged during a White House briefing in late May that his department had made plans for a $250 bill featuring Trump’s face — though Bessent emphasized congressional approval would be needed to translate the idea into reality.

The previous month, the State Department said some new passports would soon become available featuring the president’s face on one of the inside pages.

All this personal branding — and Trump’s own love of celebrity — can have downsides large and small.

The president’s attempt to append his own name to that of the Kennedy Center was ultimately blocked by the courts in an embarrassing setback. 

And last Monday, he made a high-profile return to his native New York for Game 3 of the NBA Finals, only to be roundly booed at Madison Square Garden. It didn’t help that the New York Knicks lost the game, snapping a 13-game winning streak. 

There is one other issue that could yet disrupt his UFC-themed birthday: the weather.

There is a risk of thunderstorms in the Washington area on the day. 

Organizers say they can cope with heavy rain, even if they have to pause the fights briefly. Lightning poses a graver risk.

A White House official said “standard contingency plans for weather are in place to ensure the safety of the President and all patrons.”

For once, Trump will be hoping for calm.

The Memo is a reported column by Niall Stanage.