The California Legislative Women’s Caucus is demanding that Endeavor boss Ari Emanuel fire UFC President Dana White for slapping his wife on New Year’s Eve.
In a letter sent this week, the state lawmakers chastised Emanuel for not taking any action against White — whose company is owned by Endeavor — or calling out his alleged behavior.
“Your continued silence speaks volumes. As you once wrote: ‘Silence and inaction are not an option.’ We agree — and we are urging you to take immediate action. Like you, we are people who live by our values,” wrote state Sen. Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley) and Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry (D-Winters), the chair and vice chair, respectively, of the caucus.
Beverly Hills-based Endeavor — which also owns the WME talent agency — acquired a majority stake in the mixed martial arts company UFC, in 2016.
Emanuel was not immediately available for comment.
A video of White and his wife, Anne, getting physical with each other at nightclub in Cabo San Lucas on New Year’s Eve went viral. The video, first reported by TMZ, showed White slapping his wife after she appeared to slap him, with friends then coming to the couple’s aid and pulling them apart.
According to TMZ, White said he had been drinking and told the entertainment gossip site, “You’ve heard me say for years, ‘There’s never ever an excuse for a guy to put his hands on a woman,’ and now here I am on TMZ talking about it.”
During an impromptu press conference on Wednesday, White told reporters, saying, “One thing I do want to clarify in this thing that I didn’t talk about on TMZ, because I didn’t expect it or I didn’t see it coming, is the people that are defending me. There’s never an excuse. There’s no defense for this, and people should not be defending me, no matter what. All the criticism I’ve received this week is 100% warranted.”
However, since the incident Emanuel, who publicly took Mel Gibson to task for his anti-Semitic tirade and more recently wrote an op-ed in the Financial Times calling on Kanye West’s business partners to cut ties with the rapper in the wake of his own anti-Semitic comments, has remained silent regarding White.
In their letter, the California legislators called the video of White “alarming,” saying “We are allies against violence, advocates for women, and we are parents like yourself. This is why it is clear to us: we are calling for the immediate removal of Mr. White as President of the U.F.C.”
“Our caucus, which is both bicameral and bipartisan, is composed of women across the State of California who are committed to creating better lives for women and girls. We care deeply about intimate partner violence, and we have seen how partner violence affects the lives of children and families.”
