We previously reported that the former First Lady Michelle Obama was left humiliated when UFC fighter Josh Hokit insisted that she “is a man” during his post-fight interview after his White House UFC match earlier this month. Now, the popular podcast host Joe Rogan is speaking out to defend Michelle from these claims.
Rogan acted as the emcee at the UFC’s White House event earlier in June. There, Hokit spoke out in his post-fight interview with Rogan to declare, “Michelle Obama is a man, am I right America?”
Rogan Takes Michelle’s Side
Rogan is now touching on this publicly for the first time. Indeed, he’s taking Michelle’s side by saying that Hokit never should have been invited to the White House event in the first place.
“That guy, Josh Hokit, he’s got a shtick. Like, he’s got a character, he does, The Incredible Hoke,” Rogan said on the latest episode of his podcast.
“He’s basically like a pro-wrestling bad guy, who also is a really good fighter,” he continued. “So there’s a real problem there. This guy keeps winning.”
Rogan went on to admit that organizers, in hindsight, “probably shouldn’t have had him fight on the White House lawn” if they wanted to avoid controversy.
“Because if he said that at the T-Mobile Arena or in Madison Square Garden, outrageous, but not that big a deal,” he added.
Check out Rogan’s full comments on this in the video below.
Hokit Refuses To Apologize
As for Hokit, he’s refused to back down and apologize for his remarks about Michelle.
“I thought I was giving her a compliment,” Hokit said while appearing on “The Ariel Helwani Show” this week. “Michelle Obama, being a man, that’s like, she knows how to deal with adversity. She knows how to work hard like a man; when the times get tough, the tough keep going.”
“I thought it was a perfect opportunity to show the world how great this country is with the freedom of speech,” he continued. “You can go somewhere and you say something like that, and you die. And I’m not suicidal, by the way; I’m in good spirits. I’m a little under the weather right now, but other than that, I’m good. And so in other parts of the world, you say something like that, and you’re not here to speak to Ariel Helwani, you know?”
Not stopping there, Hokit proceeded to double down.
“There’s a certain side that pokes at another side and there’s no outrage there,” he explained. “And so I thought it was a perfect time to take a jab.”
“That’s one thing about my career. I’m never going to — I think I was watching a [Henry] Cejudo video and he was like, ‘That’s one thing I regret, is all the stuff I did [to promote fights],'” Hokit added. “Or you hear people backtrack — even the [Sean] Strickland post-fight speech [after the Khamzat Chimaev fight], where he was like, ‘I’m trying to sell the fight, and I don’t mean the things I say.’ You’ll never hear me backtrack from what I say.”
As for Michelle, she has yet to publicly comment on Hokit’s remarks. Only time tell if the former First Lady ever decides to address this.