Donald Trump jokes that ‘nasty, mean’ migrants should have UFC league because they’re ‘tough’

Former President Donald Trump joked that migrants could start their own migrant fight league because they’re tough, nasty and mean.

Mr. Trump brought up the idea at two stump speeches Saturday — one to a group of Christian conservatives in Washington and later at a rally in Philadelphia.

He said he even brought up the idea to Ultimate Fighting Championship President Dana White at a recent card.

“I said, ‘Dana, I have an idea for you to make a lot of money. You’re going to go and start a new migrant fight league, only migrants,’” Mr. Trump said at the Philadelphia rally.

“And then at the end of the year, the champion migrant is going to fight your champion, and I hate to tell you Dana, I think the migrant might win, that’s how tough they are,” he said.

He made the same comment to the Christian group, saying the fight league isn’t “the worst idea I’ve had.”

“These people are tough and they’re nasty, mean,” he said

Mr. White told reporters during a press conference in Saudi Arabia, where the UFC made its debut in that country on Saturday, that the former president did say that — “It was a joke.”

“It was a joke,” Mr. White said, a second time. “I saw everybody going crazy online. But yeah, he did say it.”

The presumptive Republican nominee is quite the fan of the mixed martial arts promotion. He has appeared at multiple recent cards as Mr. White’s guest and received raucous responses from both the spectators and some of the men fighting on the card.

Mr. White also was one of the few high-profile entertainment figures to back Mr. Trump in the 2016 presidential election and he was a speaker at the Republican National Convention that year.