Last week, UFC commentator and podcast giant Joe Rogan made headlines after saying he wouldn’t attend an upcoming UFC event in Montreal because he no longer goes to Canada. He stirred the pot even more by adding that he’d “rather go to Russia” instead.
The 57-year-old’s comment didn’t sit well with some folks, especially Canadian MMA fans, likely due to the ongoing trade tensions between Canada and the U.S.
On Monday’s episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, Rogan addressed the controversy directly. Sitting down with British comedians Francis Foster and Konstantin Kisin, he clarified that while part of the comment was said jokingly, his reasons for avoiding Canada are political and not personal.
“I just wanna say to the Canadian people, I said the other day that I don’t go to Canada anymore, I’d rather go to Russia. I was joking around, first of all,” Rogan began. “I do not go to Canada anymore, [but] it’s because of the government.”
Rogan went on to explain that his boycott of the Great White North does not lie with Canadians themselves. In fact, he had plenty of praise for the people and the country. “It has nothing to do with the people. I think the people are f*cking lovely. They’re some of my favourite people of all time,” he said. “Canadian people, I think, are 20% less douchey than Americans. They’re the nicest people. They’re well-educated.”
He even shouted out two of our main cities, declaring, “Montreal’s amazing, Toronto’s amazing. I love Canada.”
His main point of contention, though, seems to be the federal government’s handling of the 2022 “Freedom Convoy” protests, during which then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act, allowing authorities to freeze the bank accounts of some protest participants.
“When you start f*cking closing people’s bank accounts because they donated to a trucker convoy and no one’s up in arms about that, you can’t let those people do that to you,” Rogan said. “That shouldn’t be legal… The next step of that is to imprison you for protesting.”
While the UFC hasn’t confirmed whether Rogan was ever officially scheduled to appear in Montreal, his absence will likely be felt as he’s called several Montreal UFC cards over the years, including UFC 83 (2008), UFC 97 (2009), UFC 113 (2010), UFC 124 (2010), UFC 154 (2012), UFC 158 (2013), and UFC 186 (2015).
With or without him, UFC 315 is set to take place at the Bell Centre on Sunday, May 10.
