UFC CCO Lays Out Contingency Plans for Freedom Fights 250

On fight week, Freedom Fights 250 is a house of cards. While the event has been promoted for nearly a year, there is still the lingering question in the back of everyone’s mind: will it actually happen? 

Craig Borsari, UFC’s Chief Content Officer and Executive Producer, spoke with the media on Wednesday on a variety of topics. Most of the media in attendance was curious to know about the contingency plans in place for this event, given that we may experience scattered showers (or even lightning) on June 14th. Borsari answered that there were “multiple” options at their disposal:

“So we have a few options; one is to stay on air, and we do have contingency planning where we can remain on air and continue to broadcast from a location close by the South Lawn, and if we feel like a weather pattern’s coming in that will pass through, and we can resume, we will. So, we would not leave the broadcast; we would just fill and report from site. It’s a bit of an evaluation, and so when we’re going through that we’ll be talking regularly to a meteorologist who is, right now, on site giving us updates. We’ll figure out what this window looks like. Do we have the ability to resume, or what is the extent of the weather front that is coming through?”

Much like UFC 306 at the Sphere, a country’s story will be told throughout the broadcast. Freedom Fights 250 will have more elements to juggle, such as America’s 250th anniversary, the White House venue, and honoring America’s military members:

“Yes, we do have some short films. Again, when you’re talking about trying to strike that right balance, you can’t do much storytelling, or you extend the broadcast to a point where we feel like it’s not a good experience for the viewer at home. But you will see some films and storytelling in more of a traditional way in between bouts. And then, we have a pretty heavy integration of celebration of the military. Obviously, I think a lot of people know that the military, all branches, will be present. So, we will have troops in the arena, and we also have other elements in terms of pre-produced pieces coming in and out of break where we’re doing even shorter bumps or teases that include the continuation of the narrative of the celebration of the 250th anniversary of this country.”

On Sunday, a federal lawsuit was filed by the Public Integrity Project on behalf of two plaintiffs from Virginia. The suit argues that Freedom Fights 250 violated Park Service regulations, that building the UFC “Claw” on the South Lawn required congressional approval as it is federal parkland, and that the project lacked a necessary environmental review. When asked what environmental assessments took place before construction began on the South Lawn, Borsari provided the following:

“The main sequence of events to get a final approval to build what we built was us working with the White House and their internal team, including their engineers and their groundskeepers, to be sure that what we were doing checked all the boxes and was approved on their end. They have a pretty robust team that was looking at our plans, and that took several months of them reviewing what we were attempting to do, what our intentions were, and then coming back with some comments, us tweaking it, resubmitting until we got to a point where they approved.”

The Public Integrity Project must submit their brief before 9 p.m. on Wednesday night. After that, Judge Mehta could grant a hearing for as early as Thursday, with a ruling as early as Friday.