UFC Sues New York State Officials In Latest MMA Legalization Attempt

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, challenges the Ban for violating numerous provisions of the United States Constitution, including the First Amendment, the Equal Protection Clause and the Due Process Clause.  Specifically, the lawsuit alleges the Ban infringes upon the rights of the fighters who want to publicly exhibit their skills as professionals and express themselves before a live audience, the rights of fans who would like to experience live professional MMA events, and the rights of those who train, publicize or otherwise advance MMA in New York.

The lawsuit points out all the obvious things that somehow haven’t mattered over the last few years.

The Ban was originally imposed in 1997, at a time when MMA was unregulated and prohibited in many other states.  Today, MMA is a highly-regulated, broadly popular sport, which experts and supporting safety data verify is as safe as or safer than many sports and activities that are legal in New York, including boxing, football and rodeo.

MMA is widely available on television in New York, and many New Yorkers lawfully train and spar in MMA.

Live professional MMA can take place in virtually every state except New York.

The individual martial arts that comprise MMA, including kickboxing, jiu-jitsu, judo, boxing and wrestling, are legal and performed live regularly in New York – it is only their combination, performed live by professionals, that is banned in New York.

It is all face-slappingly obvious to anyone with a functioning brain, but people continue to fight it because it’s new and scary. We’re not trying to legalize a drug here. This is a sport. A sport with less deaths than many of the wonderful mainstream sports that you can currently see in New York on levels ranging from amateur to Olympic to professional.

[UFC.com, Getty]