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| - Mullin, a former mixed martial arts fighter, had challenged O'Brien to a fight on X months before their confrontation during the 2023 Senate hearing. Despite their history, the Teamsters president endorsed the senator's nomination to lead the Department of Homeland Security in a statement emailed to Snopes.
After U.S. President Donald Trump nominated Sen. Markwayne Mullin, a Republican from Oklahoma, to replace Kristi Noem as Homeland Security secretary in early March 2026, footage circulated online purportedly showing Mullin challenging labor leader Sean O'Brien to a fight during a Senate hearing. As of this writing, O'Brien serves as general president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, a labor union representing workers in the U.S. and Canada.
Social media users on Instagram and Facebook shared various examples of videos of the alleged incident, with one saying Mullin was "trying to physically fight someone in the middle of a Senate hearing." An X user also claimed the senator, a former mixed martial arts fighter, challenged O'Brien "to a fight on the Senate floor" (archived):
BREAKING: This is the next Trump DHS Secretary, Markwayne Mullin.
- A former MMA fighter who 2 years ago challenged the Teamsters' President Sean O'Brien to a FIGHT on the Senate Floor
Trump "Hires the best people," my a**.
Trump is destroying America and MAGA is just sitting back and allowing it to happen.
In short, the incident did occur and the footage was authentic, meaning it was not digitally edited or generated using artificial intelligence software. The clips showed an exchange between Mullin and O'Brien during a hearing of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions on Nov. 14, 2023.
A livestream of the hearing is available on the Senate HELP Committee Republicans YouTube channel. The exchange begins at the 1:36:23 mark in
The transcript of the exchange is as follows (emphasis in bold ours):
Mullin: Now let's talk about Mr. O'Brien himself, his behavior. As everybody knows, in this hearing, the last time, him and I kind of had a back-and-forth. Appreciate
your demeano r today, it's quite different. But after you left here, you got pretty excited about the keyboard. In fact, you tweeted at me one, two, three, four, five times, and let me read what the last one said. It said, "Greedy CEO who pretends like he's self-made." Sir, I wish you was in the truck with me when I was building my plumbing company myself and my wife was running the office because I sure remember working pretty hard and long hours.
"Pretends like he's self-made. What a clown, fraud. Always has been, always will be. Quit the tough guy act in these Senate hearings. You know where to find me. Any place, anytime, cowboy."
Sir, this is a time, this is a place. If you want to run your mouth, we can be two consenting adults. We can finish it here.
O'Brien: Okay, that's fine, perfect.
Mullin: You want to do it now?
O'Brien: I'd love to do it right now.
Mullin: Well stand your butt up then.
O'Brien: You stand your butt up.
[Mullin stands up.]
At this point, Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont and then-chairman of the HELP committee, intervened to ask that the two men stop arguing, urging Mullin to sit back down as he and O'Brien continued to trade barbs.
Mullin and O'Brien were
Several days later, on June 26, Mullin shared a screenshot of O'Brien's post (archived) and the following response:
An attention-seeking union Teamster boss is trying to be punchy after our Senate hearing. Okay, I accept your challenge. MMA fight for charity of our choice. Sept 30th in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I'll give you 3 days to accept.
Mullin has three wins and zero losses on his MMA record, according to the official MMA website.
The Hill reported in July 2024 that Mullin said O'Brien had apologized to him for the exchange during the hearing.
For further reading, Snopes has covered numerous rumors about Noem during her tenure as DHS head, which is set to conclude on March 31, 2026, including a satirical claim that she once said the Bible had been written in English.
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