The streamer and content creator Adin Ross was recently caught on camera following around former president Donald Trump at UFC 287. The event which featured a highly anticipated rematch between current champion Alex Pereira and former champion Israel Adesanya was held last night in Miami, Florida.
Ross could be seen approaching Trump on multiple occasions during the show, standing up from his front row seat to shake hands towards the beginning before engaging in a short conversation after the event. The words exchanged between the two controversial figures were not recorded by the camera on account of significant background noise. The reason for shadowing Trump is unclear, but given the frequency of his right leaning remarks and support for Andrew Tate, the behavior has been seen as deeply unsurprising by almost everyone familiar with Ross. The streamer has not yet commented on the matter.
The video soon turned up on social media, uploaded to various platforms including YouTube and especially Reddit where the conversation about Ross and of course Trump remains ongoing, the official subreddit dedicated to "left-wing streamer Hasan 'HasanAbi' Piker" for example featuring comments like “what a simp” and “will Adin sniff Donald Trump's chair?”
Ross developed a large following on Twitch before transitioning to Kick earlier this year. Similar to so many other such cases, the reason behind the ban has never been clearly stated, but the content creator was most likely removed from the platform on account of his controversial content, so much of which has been criticized on the grounds of racism, sexism, ableism, and more. The streamer picked up on this in the wake of his eighth and final ban.
"I'm not even going to bash Twitch completely, but the one thing I'll say is this: if I had blue hair and did my makeup, would you have banned me, Twitch? It's a serious question,” Ross remarked about the punitive measure. “Would you have permanently banned me? If I had blue hair and did my makeup and fingernails, would you have permanently banned me, bro? No, they wouldn't have!"
The streamer has been creating content on Kick ever since the ban from Twitch, consistently churning up controversy by making hopelessly misogynistic remarks about various personalities. “You fat bitch,” Ross commented earlier this week as part of a long tirade against model Barelyyalex. “You’re fat as fuck. You need to get bullied. I don’t give a fuck. Listen to me, you fucking whale. Get on the fucking treadmill. Get in the fucking gym and lose some fucking weight. Holy fuck, you’re huge.” Ross added that Barelyyalex should "go back to Sea World.”
The incident with Trump also sparked a broader conversation about the rise of right wing politics and the ability of streamers like Ross to spread hateful ideology. While many have argued that Ross approaching Trump could set a dangerous precedent, others have been defending the streamer, stating that Ross should be able to speak with anyone he pleases. The most frequently discussed fear is that meeting Trump will cause Ross to become even more openly radicalized in his opinions, posing a serious problem for his legion of loyal followers, many of which listen almost implicitly.