Dana White’s boxing venture has the money and broadcast backing to challenge the sport’s traditional model, but Ted Cruz must help secure legislation that balances business control with fighters’ rights.
On the morning of September 16, Ted Cruz posted a letter that gave Dana White's boxing project something Saudi money could never buy outright (an endorsement from Muhammad Ali's grandson). Hours later, Cruz's Senate Commerce Committee advanced the Muhammad Ali American Boxing Revival Act by voice vote. Nico Ali Walsh, who had challenged the bill in April, now wanted senators to pass it.
For White, the timing couldn't have been any better. Zuffa Boxing has financial backing and a television partner, but the UFC-style league he wants needs Congress to approve a different legal framework. Winning over Walsh helped Cruz sell that framework as a better deal for fighters. But strip away all the celebratory headlines, and the real question is whether the actual law will deliver on that promise.
Five months earlier, Walsh put the family's name on the line. In his April 22 committee testimony, he challenged legislation that would concentrate control over fighters' careers.
“If this bill is passed in its current form, it should not have my grandfather's name on it, as it would no longer reflect the principles that his Act was created to protect,” Walsh wrote.
His reversal makes more sense once the contracts enter the picture.
White Wants More Control Over the Product
Passed in 2000, the Ali Act was designed to curb predatory business practices that frequently leave boxers financially trapped, misinformed, or compromised by conflicted managers. It restricts certain coercive contracts, requires financial disclosures, and separates promoters from managers, subject to exceptions. Those protections give fighters tools to negotiate with the people selling their work.
White’s main objective is to reshape boxing around the UFC framework, a centralized system where a single organization handles talent contracts, matchmaking, and title belts. The bill would let qualifying Unified Boxing Organizations [UBOs] operate under an alternative compliance system alongside traditional promoters. A company could build its schedule and championship story around its own roster, giving broadcasters a more predictable product to buy.
The appeal is easy to understand if you have ever waited years for two champions to meet. Fewer parties around the negotiating table can make fights easier to arrange. But the same control that helps a promoter organize the show can leave a fighter with fewer ways to negotiate a better payday. Ultimately, creating a predictable, television-ready product should not come at the expense of equitable conditions for the fighters themselves.
Zuffa can operate under existing law, and it does. Front Office Sports reported in July that White was accepting co-promotions and considering outside world-title opportunities case by case. While congressional intervention would pave the way for his preferred structure, the lack of it forces him to continue cutting deals within the very market system he is trying to disrupt.
The agreement to co-promote Ryan Garcia against Conor Benn with Golden Boy illustrates the compromise. De La Hoya could challenge Zuffa's preferred rules in Washington and still do business with it when their fighters made an attractive matchup. For White, it serves as a clear reminder that regulatory dominance isn't the only factor making high-profile matches happen(market demand still dictates the terms).
The Fight Is Over What Boxers Can Negotiate
The House passed its version on March 24, with Brian Jack and Sharice Davids leading the bipartisan effort. Joe Courtney opposed it, warning about weakened protections and contracts that could leave fighters dependent on one organization.
In December 2025, Top Rank founder Bob Arum argued UBOs would escape rules on coercive contracts, financial disclosures, and separation between managers and promoters. While his initial objections focused on early drafts of the legislation, the subsequent revisions to the bill warrant a closer look.
Even the endorsement list needed checking. USA Boxing withdrew its support letter in February, explaining that its board had never authorized it. The amateur governing body took no position on the bill. Calling that an outright rejection would give the opposition support the organization never offered.
At April's hearing, WWE president and Zuffa executive Nick Khan argued that fighters could choose the proposed system. His written testimony presented the UBO as another route through the sport.
“A UBO is not a governing body. It is not a mandate. It is an alternative, a higher-standard pathway. Boxers are free to participate or not,” Khan wrote.
The strength of that promise depends on what happens after a boxer signs. Signing an initial contract is simple, but maintaining enough leverage to negotiate the next one is a much more complex challenge for a fighter. Golden Boy boss Oscar De La Hoya brought that concern to the same hearing, drawing on his experience as a fighter and promoter.
“This is a fundamental shift in power that if changed would put corporate profits first, fighters second,” De La Hoya wrote in his prepared testimony.
Critics frequently point to the UFC's own operational history to back up these concerns. A judge approved its $375 million settlement in 2025 over former fighters' claims that the company suppressed pay. UFC denied wrongdoing, and the settlement establishes no finding against Zuffa Boxing. Still, borrowing the UFC's structure naturally invites scrutiny of how that structure treats labor.
The legislation offers safeguards. The House text sets a $200 per-round floor, caps UBO contracts at six years, and requires a fight every six months or payment tied to the contract's minimum, with exceptions. At the statutory floor, that payment is $2,000. Medical coverage includes a $50,000 minimum for bout injuries. While these are meaningful safeguards, a guaranteed minimum check does little to show a boxer whether their actual payout aligns with the massive revenue they help bring in.
Senate negotiations brought changes: three years for a boxer's first professional promotional agreement, a 90-day window to talk with other promoters before expiry, and additional financial disclosures to fighters.
The committee also adopted requirements covering payments to regulators and rankings transparency. Walsh's September endorsement credited improvements to contracts, free agency, disclosure, and the manager-promoter firewall. While Walsh’s backing proves that negotiations have already altered the proposal, the final legislative language will ultimately dictate just how much contractual freedom fighters actually retain.
TKO Gets Paid While Sela Supplies the Capital
Follow the money and White's urgency becomes easier to understand. TKO, which owns UFC and WWE, built the venture with Saudi entertainment company Sela and Turki Alalshikh. Management has described a roughly $10 million annual operating fee with no TKO funding obligation, plus separate opportunities to earn fees from major fights. As a result of this structure, TKO is positioned to generate steady revenue from management fees long before the league itself ever turns a profit.
On TKO's August earnings call, finance chief Andrew Schleimer explained the attraction to investors.
“This is low risk, but allows us to have our fingerprints on a third combat sport vertical, with a path for meaningful equity ownership that will ultimately enhance our firm value. We're here to build something, but we have no funding obligations, and we don't take financial risk,” Schleimer said.
This dynamic shifts the financial risk entirely away from TKO, leaving Sela responsible for bankrolling the entire operation. Paramount's agreement supplies distribution in the United States, Canada, and Latin America, starting with 12 cards in 2026. From Paramount's perspective, a steady stream of boxing content serves as a reliable way to retain subscribers during the gaps between major sporting seasons. For TKO, a lasting league could combine management income with ownership value. Neither outcome guarantees fighters a growing share of revenue.
Cruz Still Needs the Senate to Finish
Cruz helped move the college sports bill through the Senate 77-22 on September 28, demonstrating that a sports coalition can survive a divided chamber. Boxing still needs its own floor passage, agreement between the chambers, and presidential approval. Committee approval leaves those steps unfinished. Because the current congressional session wraps up on January 3, any further delay means the entire legislative push could expire and force them to restart from scratch.
So return to that September morning. Walsh's letter gave Cruz a persuasive answer to critics who said the bill betrayed Ali's legacy. White gained political momentum for the league he wants, and TKO could see a clearer route toward building its investment. The next test is whether Congress can deliver rules that let a promoter build a valuable business while leaving its fighters enough freedom to bargain for their share of what they generate.
