See Dana White Bet $1 Million on a Single Baccarat Hand

^{Dana White sends a message to MGM after winning $1 million on a single hand of baccarat at Park MGM in Las Vegas. (Screenshot: YouTube / @SteveWillDoIt)}

LAS VEGAS – For a few hours this weekend, President Donald Trump wanted Dana White to be his White House press secretary. Or said he did. CNN reported that White declined; Trump later said he was “only kidding.”

I had a feeling White would say no. Not because I know him, but because my feed has been inundated with his talking about how much he likes to gamble, how big he wants to gamble, how much he loves Las Vegas, and how much he loves the UFC business he built. It was hard to imagine him moving to Washington D.C.

The latest evidence surfaced for me last week – a video from a Sept. 29 session at Park MGM, where White put $1 million on a single hand of baccarat and won. I saw it in a shortened Facebook reel, but it comes from a longer YouTube video embedded below.

One Hand, $1 Million x 2

In the video, White is with his friend Stephen Deleonardis, the popular social media personality who goes by SteveWillDoIt, in a private high-roller salon. Wearing the standard Vegas middle-aged man uniform of a black t-shirt and dark jeans, White steps up to the maroon felt and says, “Give me a million dollars.”

The dealer smiles as White repeats himself: “Give me a million dollars.”

“Give the man a million!” someone from his entourage shouts. The dealer places a marker on the table, and White stacks 10 gray $100,000 chips on Player.

In baccarat, the goal is to get as close to 9 as possible. Tens and face cards are worth zero. White’s first two cards – an 8 and a 6 – total 4, so he gets another card. He peeks at the pips, then slams onto the table a 5 – bleow! – giving him a 9 to win over the banker’s 8.

The room explodes. There are whoops, hollers, high-fives and fist bumps. A smiling White looks up at an MGM security camera, raises two middle fingers and declares, “F— you!”

Deleonardis had arranged the session after asking White to help find a casino willing to take a seven-figure wager. Park MGM agreed, but with a couple of house rules: Each man got only one $1 million hand, and they could not bet on the same side.

Deleonardis lost his one authorized $1 million hand, but he kept playing. He eventually clawed his way back and finished the session roughly $800,000 ahead, according to reports.

White, suddenly the voice of moderation, encouraged him to take the money and run.

White Explains the Wager

At a press conference the next day, White was asked whether the Park MGM bet was the largest single-hand wager of his career.

It wasn’t. White said he had wagered $1 million at Bellagio a few weeks earlier and won that hand, too.

He said Deleonardis later asked how he could make the same bet, so White called MGM. The casino agreed to take Deleonardis’ wager only if White put up another $1 million alongside him.

White also confirmed that Park MGM would allow only one seven-figure hand apiece.

“Thank God,” he said.

Is Dana White a Problem Gambler?

White knows the pain of losing. He says he once lost $8 million in a night.

In a separate story told to Lex Fridman in 2024, White said he got so drunk while gambling at the Rio that he believed he had lost $85,000. The next day, his casino host told him the actual loss was $3 million.

White said he never drank again while playing cards, but the responsible gambling literature says that increasing your bets to experience the same thrill can be a yellow flag.

We’re not ones to judge and won’t even pretend to understand the financial calculations made by the creator of the biggest sports success story of the 21st century.

But two years earlier, on a 2024 episode of the Full Send podcast, White was talking about how Caesars Palace was letting him bet $350,000 a hand and Bellagio set his max at $400,000.

When someone asked whether he could get to $1 million a hand, White called it his “goal in life before I die.”

“I want $30 million in credit and a million a hand,” he said.

His dream is apparently starting to come true.

Gambling discussion begins at 51:50. White gets into the $350,000 and $400,000 limits at 54:14 and calls betting $1 million a hand his goal at 56:36.

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