In July, President Donald Trump revealed that part of next year’s Independence Day celebration marking the 250th anniversary of the Second Continental Congress adopting the Declaration of Independence establishing the United States of America, a UFC event will be held on the White House grounds.
Upon hearing the announcement, two-division champion Jon Jones quickly ended his retirement in hopes of fighting at the historic event. Two weeks earlier, Jones relinquished the heavyweight championship and abruptly retired.
Despite Jones’ willingness to return next summer against whoever holds the heavyweight title at the time, UFC CEO Dana White recently said the odds of Jones being featured on the White House fight card were a ‘billion to one.’
Interestingly, former two-division champion and notorious rival of Jones, Daniel Cormier, believes the fight promotion needs to have Jones compete that night to ensure a win for an American fighter.
“They’re talking about the White House, a White House fight card. Hey man, we’ve got to have some Americans win,” Cormier said during an appearance on Club Shay Shay.
“I don’t like Jon Jones. It’s not secret. The whole world knows that. I said, ‘Man, ya’ll better put Jon Jones on there because right now ain’t got one American in the Top 10 pound-for-pound (rankings).’ I said, ‘If ya’ll want an American dude to go get a victory, put Jon Jones in there because he’s going to win.’ That’s what he does.”
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Jones has re-entered the UFC anti-doping testing pool. He’s back in the gym training and responded to Dana White’s ‘billion to one’ comment.
“Despite the odds, I’m still training and optimistic about the possibility of being part of the White House event. At the end of the day, Dana is the boss and it’s his call whether I compete that night or not. I do know Dana was really excited about the fight, and the door hasn’t been completely closed. That’s all a guy like me really needs,” Jones wrote on X.
“It sounds like another awesome goal to be inspired by. Sometimes in life, we’re not going to reach everything we set out to do and that’s okay. But I like my chances… after all, one in a billion is exactly what it took to end up as Jon ‘Bones’ Jones in the first place.”
