UFC White House fight card: Ilia Topuria vs. Justin Gaethje to headline event

Topuria and Gaethje will unify the lightweight title while Alex Pereira will look to make history at heavyweight

By Brent Brookhouse

Mar 7, 2026 at 10:48 pm ET • 3 min read

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Since President Donald Trump floated the idea of a UFC event on the White House South Lawn, fans have speculated on what fights would be booked for such a unique fight card. UFC CEO Dana White delivered the answer to that question during Saturday's UFC 326 broadcast, announcing a main event fight between lightweight champion Ilia Topuria and interim champ Justin Gaethje, with Alex Pereira vs. Ciryl Gane for the interim heavyweight championship serving as the co-main event.

Gaethje earned the interim title with a dominant win over Paddy Pimblett at UFC 324, earning what is likely his last shot at becoming an undisputed UFC champion. The door for Gaethje was left open when Topuria took time off from his fighting career to deal with personal issues.

Topuria is a perfect 17-0 in his mixed martial arts career. After six wins to start his UFC career, Topuria defeated one of the greatest featherweights of all-time, Alexander Volkanovski, by knockout to capture the 145-pound championship. Topuria put a final stamp on his featherweight career in his lone title defense, knocking out Max Holloway in the third round.

Topuria moved to lightweight in 2025, where he continued his streak of knockout wins over legendary fighters by taking less than half of a round to knock out Charles Oliveira to capture the UFC lightweight championship.

HISTORY WILL BE MADE

[ #UFCWhiteHouse | Sunday June 14 on @ParamountPlus ] pic.twitter.com/XKuiCjZvBn
— UFC (@ufc) March 8, 2026

Gaethje is one of the most exciting fighters in MMA history, though his exciting style has not translated to undisputed UFC gold. In 15 UFC fights, Gaethje has earned 15 post-fight bonuses.

Gaethje defeated Tony Ferguson in 2020 to win the interim lightweight title for a first time, though he lost to then-lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov in his next fight. Gaethje again came up short of holding the "big belt" when he was submitted by Charles Oliveira in the first round of a bout for the then-vacant 155-pound title in 2022.

The following year, Gaethje knocked out Dustin Poirier to capture the ceremonial BMF championship, losing it at UFC 300 when he was knocked out in the literal final second by Holloway.

Pereira won the UFC middleweight championship in just his eighth MMA bout with a knockout of former kickboxing rival Israel Adesanya at UFC 281. After losing the belt back to Adesanya in a UFC 287 rematch, Pereira moved up to the light heavyweight division.

One fight after making the move, Pereira scored a TKO win over Jiri Prochazka to win the then-vacant 205-pound championship. Pereira made three successful title defenses, establishing himself as a near guaranteed future Hall of Fame inductee in the process. While he dropped the title to Magomed Ankalaev at UFC 313, Pereira regained the title in a UFC 320 rematch, taking just 80 seconds to score the stoppage.

Pereira vacated that title to move up in pursuit of becoming the first three-division champion in UFC history, and capturing the interim title all but guarantees Pereira the chance to fight for undisputed heavyweight gold in the near future.

Gane is looking for a fourth crack at becoming heavyweight champion when he faces Pereira. His lone career losses came against Francis Ngannou and Jon Jones in title fights. Gane took a third shot at the belt against Tom Aspinall at UFC 321 this past October and put in a tremendous performance before an accidental eye poke to both of Aspinall's eyes left the champion unable to continue the fight, resulting in a no-contest.

Between the Jones and Aspinall fights, Gane picked up wins over Serghei Spivac and Alexander Volkov.

Check out the full fight card announcement below.