Mick Foley’s resolution to sever ties with WWE marked a big second in skilled wrestling on December 16, 2025, when the legendary wrestler introduced by way of Instagram that he would not symbolize the corporate whereas Donald Trump stays president.
Mick Foley Leaves the WWE
The announcement adopted Trump’s controversial feedback about director Rob Reiner’s demise days earlier, which Foley described because the “ultimate straw” in his long-standing issues about WWE’s deepening relationship with the forty fifth president.
This departure is an element of a bigger actuality that has outlined the sports activities leisure panorama lately: the entanglement {of professional} wrestling, combined martial arts, and American political energy has change into inextricably linked by Trump’s decades-long relationships with each industries.
Foley’s assertion acknowledged his mounting discomfort with WWE’s proximity to Trump over the previous months, significantly concerning what he characterised because the administration’s “merciless and inhumane therapy of immigrants,” and anybody who seems like an immigrant.
Nevertheless, Trump’s response to Reiner’s December 14 demise, when the president prompt the filmmaker’s passing was “reportedly because of the anger he prompted others by his huge, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a thoughts crippling illness often called TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME,” crossed a line Foley may not settle for.
On December 16, Trump doubled down on these claims when chatting with journalists within the Oval Workplace, calling Reiner “a deranged individual so far as Trump is worried.” The Reiner incident, which has drawn bipartisan criticism, concerned the deaths of each the director and his spouse Michele Singer Reiner, with police investigating the deaths as an obvious murder with the couple’s son in custody. No credible proof, presently, has related their deaths to political motivations, making Trump’s framing significantly inflammatory.
The skilled wrestler’s departure carries weight as a result of his tenure with WWE spanned transformative eras of the corporate’s historical past. Foley, now 60 years previous, performed a big position in WWE’s aggressive success through the Monday Evening Wars of the Nineteen Nineties and was inducted into the WWE Corridor of Fame in 2013, the identical yr as Trump himself acquired the distinction for his celeb appearances at main occasions.
In his Instagram message, Foley acknowledged he wouldn’t be making any appearances for the corporate so long as Trump stays in workplace and wouldn’t signal a brand new Legends deal when his present contract expires in June 2025. Foley’s progressive political stance is well-documented; he has beforehand spoken in opposition to Trump in media interviews, together with a September 2020 look the place he mentioned supporting the “proper aspect of historical past” through the 2020 election, expressing concern about future generations finding out “this time period and surprise how we stood by and let a lot go mistaken.”
“PARTING WAYS WITH WWE
Whereas I’ve been involved about WWE‘s shut relationship with Donald Trump for a number of months — particularly in gentle of his administration’s ongoing merciless and inhumane therapy of immigrants (and just about anybody who “seems like an immigrant”) — studying the President’s extremely merciless feedback within the wake of Rob Reiner’s demise is the ultimate straw for me.
I not want to symbolize an organization that coddles a person so seemingly void of compassion as he marches our nation in direction of autocracy. Final evening, I knowledgeable @WWE expertise relations that I might not be making any appearances for the corporate so long as this man stays in workplace.
Moreover, I can’t be signing a brand new Legends deal when my present one expires in June. I like WWE, will at all times treasure my time with them, and I’m deeply appreciative for all of the alternatives they afforded me. However, within the phrases of Popeye the sailor, “I stands all I can stands, and I can’t stands no extra.””
The Trump administration’s immigration enforcement operations have intensified dramatically since January 2025, offering context for Foley’s particular issues concerning the administration’s therapy of communities. ICE has performed raids throughout main cities together with Atlanta, Boston, Denver, Miami, New York Metropolis, Philadelphia, and Washington D.C., detaining hundreds of individuals. Simultaneous operations involving unmarked automobiles, warrantless arrests, and techniques together with helicopter raids with flashbangs at residential complexes. As of December 2025, roughly 59,000 individuals have been held in ICE custody, exceeding detention capability by 140 p.c, with over 70 p.c having no prison document. The administration approved ICE to conduct raids in colleges, hospitals, and locations of worship.
Donald Trump’s Connections to the WWE
Following his 2013 Corridor of Fame induction, Trump moved past appearance-based involvement and into what may very well be described as built-in affect. WWE’s administration construction has more and more mirrored alignment with Trump’s political orbit. Paul “Triple H” Levesque, WWE’s Chief Content material Officer, and his spouse Stephanie McMahon, the daughter of Vince and Linda McMahon, met with Trump on the White Home as lately as September 2025 and shared a joint Instagram put up celebrating the go to.
Different distinguished wrestlers have adopted go well with; WWE Champion Cody Rhodes has made appearances at Trump rallies, and Roman Reigns, the corporate’s greatest present star, advised Selection in 2025 that he helps the president and indicated he voted for him within the earlier election.
The Trump administration’s connection to skilled wrestling extends past ceremonial appearances. Linda McMahon, the co-founder of WWE alongside her husband Vince, now serves as Secretary of the Division of Training, a place she secured by a 51-45 party-line Senate vote on March 3, 2025. McMahon’s private relationship with Trump traces again to the Nineteen Eighties when he first grew to become concerned with WWE.
After leaving WWE in 2009, she served as Trump’s administrator throughout his first time period from 2017 to 2019, receiving an overwhelmingly bipartisan 81-19 affirmation vote at the moment. Her return to Trump’s administration as Training Secretary has confirmed extra contentious, as she faces a contested affirmation partly as a result of a lately filed lawsuit alleging she and Vince knowingly enabled sexual abuse by an worker through the Seventies by Nineteen Nineties. The McMahons deny these allegations, and the litigation is presently on maintain because the Maryland Supreme Courtroom revisits state statute of limitations legal guidelines.
Trump and the UFC
Trump’s involvement with UFC represents a parallel monitor of affect that has maybe confirmed much more consequential to the group’s trajectory. Dana White, UFC President, advised enterprise publications: “No person took us critically. Besides Donald Trump.” Trump’s resolution to host UFC occasions at his on line casino offered the organizational legitimacy vital for the game to penetrate mainstream markets.
Whereas UFC grew and finally was acquired by Endeavor and merged with WWE to type TKO Group Holdings in 2023, White’s private relationship with Trump developed right into a political partnership that reached its apex through the 2024 election cycle. White grew to become instrumental in Trump’s marketing campaign technique focusing on youthful male voters, a demographic essential to Trump’s electoral efficiency.
White facilitated Trump’s look on Joe Rogan’s podcast and coordinated appearances on different right-leaning applications in what The Guardian described as connecting “MAGA and the manosphere,” the loosely affiliated ecosystem of podcasters, streamers, and content material creators who attraction primarily to younger males.
White spoke at Trump’s Madison Sq. Backyard rally simply earlier than the November 2024 election and was current at Trump’s victory celebration in West Palm Seaside, Florida, the place Trump reminisced about aiding White in securing venues throughout UFC’s early struggles.
Cash & Mergers
The monetary implications of Trump’s affect on each WWE and UFC have change into measurable. TKO Group Holdings, the father or mother firm created by the 2023 merger of WWE and UFC, noticed its inventory worth enhance roughly 40 p.c following Trump’s 2024 election victory, reaching a valuation of practically $30 billion. Linda McMahon retains substantial monetary pursuits within the merged entity, holding greater than $50 million in TKO Group shares as of early 2025, although her precise possession stake has diminished considerably by Vince McMahon’s departures and inventory gross sales.
The Trump administration has additionally leveraged the merged entity for political functions. In October 2025, Trump introduced plans for a UFC championship combat on the White Home to commemorate America’s 250th birthday, characterizing the occasion as demonstrating “TKO Group’s model fairness” whereas concurrently aligning the sporting spectacle with presidential authority.
The Trump administration’s has signaled unprecedented willingness to facilitate massive company mergers. FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, appointed by Trump, acknowledged the company’s “job is to get out of the way in which” when transactions don’t violate antitrust regulation. This shift materialized when the FCC, chaired by Trump appointee Brendan Carr, authorised the $8.4 billion Paramount-Skydance merger on July 24, 2025, in a party-line vote.
Instantly following that approval, Paramount secured an unique seven-year, $7.7 billion UFC broadcasting deal. TKO Group’s inventory worth elevated roughly 40 p.c following Trump’s 2024 election victory. The administration’s regulatory stance would profit entities whose management maintains shut private relationships with the president.
Why did Mick Foley Depart the WWE?
Foley’s resolution to step away from WWE should be understood inside this context of institutional entanglement. His acknowledged issues about WWE’s “shut relationship with Donald Trump” replicate the truth that the corporate’s administration and principal shareholders have change into intertwined with Trump’s political community in ways in which prolong far past ceremonial appearances or nostalgic WWE storylines.
Foley’s objection to Trump’s feedback about Rob Reiner’s demise displays anxieties concerning the tone and character of political management that WWE’s seen alignment with Trump implies. The filmmaker, who died beneath circumstances now being investigated as a murder, had been a vocal Trump critic all through his life. Trump’s resolution to weaponize Reiner’s demise by attributing it to opposition to his presidency violated typical political norms.
