UFC President Dana White promised to remove Peloton stationary bikes from his gym over its dispute with a comedian having Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on his podcast.
Comedian Theo Von’s podcast This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von was sponsored by Peloton through a Sept. 25 episode where the comedian, whose full name is Theodor Capitani von Kurnatowski, interviewed Kennedy. During their conversation, Kennedy details how he came to his controversial conclusions surrounding vaccines. At the time, Kennedy was running for the Democratic presidential nomination but has since switched to be an independent candidate. On Tuesday, Von had White on his podcast to discuss the fallout.
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“We have Robert Kennedy Jr. on and we had a company called, a couple companies call, after that and say, yeah, just stuff about him. ‘We’re not advertising this episode,'” Von said. “My advertiser’s like, ‘You guys need to take the episode down.'”
“What’s wrong with him?” White asked.
“Nothing,” Von, who claims to have known Kennedy for seven years, said.
“Nothing. Guy’s f***ing brilliant,” White repeated. “He’s a Democrat [with] common sense, right? He’s like an old-school Democrat.”
Later in the episode, Von revealed the advertiser who called about the episode was Peloton. White immediately called for the company’s bikes to be removed from the UFC’s gym, and even called in UFC head of production Craig Borsari to fill him in on why the UFC would no longer work with Peloton.
“F*** you Peloton,” White said. “My guys are gonna take the Pelotons out of the gym today. We’re getting rid of ’em. We’re gonna go throw them in the f***ing garbage today.”
While White offered that Von’s crew film the bikes being removed, that was not included in the episode, even though Von joked that he would help throw the bikes away.
Senior Vice President of Peloton Ben Boyd clarified in a statement to the Washington Examiner that the company’s request to Von came after his first episode with Kennedy, which aired in December 2021. Boyd claimed Peloton came to Von in February 2022 with its request.
“Peloton asked This Past Weekend to remove our ad in proximity to that episode on YouTube. We did not ask that the episode be pulled. We would never ask someone to take down their content,” Boyd said. “Per our Brand Safety Guidelines, we do not advertise in proximity to political editorial content of any kind — left, right, or center. We avoid political editorial content along with a host of other things such as nudity and drugs. It’s worth noting that we share our Brand Safety Guidelines with podcasts when we engage with them for sponsorship/advertising so This Past Weekend was made aware of our standards when we first began our sponsorship of the podcast.”
The very next month, Von had an episode with another Peloton ad that featured a discussion of pornography. Peloton terminated its sponsorship program with the podcast shortly after.
“I have mad respect for Theo Von and what he’s built and his audience and applaud his success. And, I know his audience enjoys the conversations he hosts,” Boyd said. “The growth of his podcast is a testament to his ability to connect with his audience and we respect that skill and talent. In fact, some of our team members and Members enjoy him and subscribe. Again, nothing but respect for what he’s built.”
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“This is America, you can f***ing have whoever you want on your podcast,” White assured the comedian.
Kennedy is one of two independent candidates running for president in 2024, the other being activist Cornel West. There are four Democratic candidates, including incumbent President Joe Biden, Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN), author Marianne Williamson, and news anchor Cenk Uygur.
