The Trump Sports Curse Reaches FIFA

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1:27I do not follow U.S. soccer, especially closely. But on Monday night, when I sat down to watch the World Cup, the U.S. versus Belgium, even I could tell it was not going well. Yes, I mean, it was a mess in a lot of different ways. I called up sports journalist June Lee to confirm my suspicions. He's got a great YouTube channel. You should really look him up. I think the team looked really stiff coming out, in large part because this was the biggest set of eyeballs they've had on this team. I mean, a lot of Americans who don't watch sports were watching the game last night because the U.S. was in the round of 16.

2:09And the round of 16 is where the U.S. historically is kicked out. Yes, has always flamed out. It was a brutal beatdown. Like at one point, Belgium scored a goal because the American goalie just wasn't there. The final goal that Belgium scored, it was just like a bonus show-off goal in the final moments of the game. I was like, what? You didn't even need to do that. And there was a level of taunting there too where the Belgium team did the Trump dance after the goal. And I think that kind of speaks to the entire cloud that was hanging over this event yesterday.

2:52The cloud hanging over this event was, who else? President Trump. Trump, of course, is the reason the World Cup is being hosted in the U.S. in the first place. He courted FIFA back in his first term. And Trump had been relatively quiet about the event until the last week or so when American star Fuller and Baligan got a red card in the U.S. team's penultimate game. That red card should have meant Baligan, who most people call Flo, got sidelined during this week's matchup with Belgium. But Trump made a call to his friend Gianni Infantino, FIFA's president. And suddenly, this unappealable red card.

3:29Well, never mind. It didn't matter on the pitch, though. The U.S. still lost, 4-1. The U.S. had been, within the country at least, a feel-good story because they had exceeded expectations. And then suddenly, when Donald Trump gets involved and is getting a red card for the star striker Flo Balik and suspended, the entire world is suddenly like, wait, this doesn't happen. It hasn't happened in a tournament like the World Cup since 1963, I believe, in 1964. So exceptional. And I mean, it really just seemed to me this loss was brutal for a lot of reasons. But one of the reasons was that Donald Trump had done everything he could to tip the scales in the U.S.'s favor.

4:11So then to lose, I don't know. there's both an element of comeuppance and like an element of like really but you still lost yes and i think that it made the event a geopolitical event even more so than a sporting event the white house and trump had been relatively kind of hands-off with the entire tournament since it started up until everything that happened with with baligan and fifa yeah one writer at the ringer put it like this the vibes were immaculate suddenly they sucked yes and it just people who were excited about the team in despite all of the politics and the situation heading into the world cup it just put a big damper on it i think you could you could sense the tension that the team felt in the first 10 minutes they just came out so slow and sluggish and we're just not present on the field.

5:11And this kind of stuff always affects players. Can I ask you a question that my family thought I should not ask? Given what happened here, did the U.S. team deserve this brutal loss? Ooh. I would say from like a karma standpoint, maybe, like as a country, part of what has made this team so fun to root for is that this team is actually a very idealistic idea of what America could be. Like, the star player who's emerged is Flo Balagan, who was a birthright citizen, was born in the U.S., in part because his parents were on vacation, his mom wasn't allowed back on the flight back to the U.K. And at the same time, he became the symbol for this, like, corruption coming out of the White House and this tinkering behind-the-scenes dealings, which is, you know, a reality of how a lot of the world works at the highest levels of power.

6:08Today on the show, the World Cup got trumped. Where does that leave U.S. soccer? I'm Mary Harris. You're listening to What Next. Stick around.

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9:55Okay, for non-soccer fans in the house, I wonder if we can go back. I want to explain to my listeners how hard the U.S. worked to have a better World Cup than this. Like, in 2024, the U.S. brought on a new head coach, this guy Mauricio Pochettino. can you just tell me why like what was he supposed to do and why did so many people put their faith in him pochettino is this fascinating figure because he is argentinian he is a guy who has coached at the highest levels of the sport he coached messy yes he's coached messy he's coached at the biggest clubs in the world he's the type of guy when a major club needs a new manager he's almost always in the conversation because of his reputation and his track record in the past.

10:47So the reason why that happened, he came over to the United States is because the U.S. donors were basically like, we're hosting the World Cup and we need to perform better than we have in the past. And there were two years out. We got to get it together. Yeah, we need to get it together because in 2018, the U.S. men's team did not qualify for the World Cup. They lost and flamed out in a really embarrassing match in Trinidad and Tobago. And it was kind of the turning point where they got the team to a point and they were able to build a roster and a foundation where there's this idea of one American savior, I think, that has permeated through the state of men's soccer.

11:26Or like any sport. We love the idea of a hero. Like it's all about LeBron or whatever. Like any sport has this in the United States. Yes. There's this American idea, I think, around saviors. And it transcends, obviously, sports, too. like you see this in tech with Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg when Facebook started, you know, the presidents. Like there is this idea of the savior, I think is inherent in American culture. Soccer is the worst possible sport to apply that logic because it is such an ultimate team game. It is 11 people on a field. It is an enormous field. You need everyone to contribute.

12:00And what has happened in the United States on the men's side over the course of the last four years, but especially the last two years, is they've learned to play like a team and build up the depth. and Pochettino has come in and changed the culture where... He made everyone audition for a part, basically, right? Exactly. Like he had like 70 players compete against each other, no matter seniority. So there was this culture within the U.S. men's soccer team. It's a lot of guys who have gone overseas or have kind of been in this position of being almost guaranteed a spot for basically their entire lives dating back to their childhood.

12:32As a result, there was a lot of guys who felt as if their spots were guaranteed and they kind of got lazy and complacent. And Pochettino came in and said, none of your spots are guaranteed. You have to play for them. You have to fight for them. And you could see that cultural shift change in the way that this team played in this tournament. There is much more cohesion within the men's team than there has been in the past. And there was a lot of growing pains when Pochettino came in. A lot of the players initially didn't like what was happening because they had a level of security and were able to be complacent in a way that they hadn't been in the past.

13:06Well, ironically, like the result of all of this field testing was that a real star did emerge from all of this in Flo Balagan, who was a player who could have chosen to play for a number of different teams. He could have played for Nigeria, which is where his family's from. He could have played for the UK because that's, I believe, where he was raised. But by accident, he was born in the United States. And so he was recruited to play for the U.S. team. And Flo Balogin is really where the story of where things began to go south starts, right? This is the game before this last game with Bosnia-Herzegovina.

13:45Can you just explain what happened here? He got a red card from the ref. For people who don't know what that means or why this was controversial, can you just explain to someone who is clearly watching the game? Yeah, so Flo Balogin is the team's best striker. He had scored the most goals for this team throughout the course of this tournament. and on a play where he was trying to get the ball back, he stepped on the foot ankle of another player. It looked to be accidental contact in the moment, but the referee looked at it on VAR, which is their video - Video assisted review. Yes, referee. Their instant replay system that they used to help kind of figure out these penalty calls and determined it was a red card.

14:25The red card is the worst, right? Yes, it is the worst possible thing. they were playing with 10 players instead of 11 for the rest of the game which is that's already like obviously a huge kick in the nuts basically and then on top of that if you get a red card you're suspended for the next game and so there was this panic after the game even though the the u.s team had actually played pretty well with 10 guys and without flow balligan their offense was still very good in that match for the rest of the of the match um you know it's the star player He's the guy who scored the most goal. People started freaking out.

14:57Flameligan himself had like a very stoic reaction, right? Yes. Like he shook the hand of the ref after. Yes. And even though most people who follow soccer did not believe that it was a red card, it's a red card. And, you know, the rules of the World Cup typically mean that you can't appeal and it is what it is, even if the call was wrong. It's just kind of the way the dice rolls. It's sports like sometimes stuff just doesn't go your way. sometimes the dice doesn't just doesn't roll your way. And that's part of, I think, the beauty of it, because it's human. Ultimately, like, we're not robots. And the fact that these games have human mistakes leads to some of the best stories, I think, in sports history.

15:35Yeah. So the red card happens. Everyone's assuming that we're just not going to see this player in the next game. And then when do things change? So everyone assumes Flo Balogun is not going to be playing in the next game. There's a level of resignation, I think, from there. What's happening behind the scenes is Donald Trump is calling up FIFA president Johnny Infantino. And at first, this is like a rumor, right? Yes. Or even a joke. Classic Trumpism. It starts out as a joke and then it's actually real. Exactly. People thought it might be a joke. It was just like something that you would kid about on Twitter or whatever.

16:13But yeah, in the back of your mind, it's like, maybe this could happen because like Infantino has created a FIFA Peace Prize just to make Trump happy. He's showed up at the White House a lot of times and been very flattering to Trump during the process of all that. So it's like, OK, well, they have a relationship. And FIFA historically is one of the most corrupt organizations in the world. It is not implausible that this could happen. But I don't think anyone believed that it actually would. Well, it's against FIFA's rules explicitly, right? It is. Yes, it is explicitly against FIFA's rules that they have any appeal of a red card.

16:49The situation is that Trump calls up Infantino and appeals to him to review the situation. He never says, reverse it altogether, make sure Balogin plays. I'm just saying stuff. I'm just making suggestions. Let's just say stuff and see what happens. This is the politics of how all of this works. And Johnny Infantino and the FIFA committee, they go into the rulebook and they pull out this obscure rule that you can suspend a red card. So Balakin still has to serve that red card at some point in the future, but they're able to suspend it. Okay. It's like a get out of jail freak card. Basically. That they've kind of...

17:33It's a very obscure thing in the rulebook that has never been used, basically. I mean, Johnny Infantino says he did not play a role in this decision. Is that credible? No. At all? no okay i think that there's no credibility to any of it um because i think that like i think there's this idea when people think about how corruption happens in a cartoonish like movie style way that's like hey can you commit the crime for me and then the other person's like yeah i'll go commit that crime for you you know but in actuality and how power works in these higher rooms it's a lot of suggestions and it's a lot of like threats of power that go unspoken that shape and inform these conversations and for someone like johnny infantino the united states is not just the host country but is the largest sports market in the entire world that soccer wants to continue to break into and the u.s is going to have a better chance of winning this game and therefore help FIFA make more money, not just this year, but for centuries in the future if Flo Balgan plays this game.

18:45So it's a financial decision. Yeah. I mean, something that bugged me a lot about some of the reaction to this red card Trump thing is how the sports of it all kind of seem to scramble people's brains because there is an argument that the ref made a bad call here. Yes. But I really do believe if you are calling Donald Trump corrupt for pushing meme coins or getting a new Air Force One from Qatar, calling Gianni Infantino, it's like part and parcel of the same thing. Right. But you had people like Hakeem Jeffries being like, Balogun's free. And I was like, guy, we have to like speak with one voice here.

19:30It was kind of a trap for Democrats in many ways, because if you're like poo-pooing the situation as a politician, especially, it's like, do you not want the United States to win? That's a bad political spot to be in. It's a bad luck. Yeah. So you kind of have to celebrate at the same time. Like, this is the political corruption. This is the exact type of political corruption that is not just changing the United States, but changing the world right now. You know, we went to war without it going to Congress. Like, this is the exact type of thing that's happening. I had a lot of friends who are, I would say, not Trump's biggest fans text me yesterday being like, this is the first time he's ever done some corruption that has made me feel good.

20:07You know, it's just like there's almost this like nihilistic reaction to it, which I can actually understand to a certain degree, given how much corruption feels like is so blatantly in your face in the world right now. I think it's also one of Trump's superpowers is that he understands the symbolic and political importance of sports because it can get people who don't like him on literally every single political issue that affects our like material conditions in life on a day to day basis to be like, yeah, this corruption is working for me. After the break. So how did FIFA become this corrupt?

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21:46Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at goo.gle slash workspace with Gemini. That's goo.gle slash workspace with Gemini. My theory about this red card and Trump's reaction to it has been the whole thing is the most FIFA thing ever. And I wonder if you agree with me on that. Just because FIFA has had so many allegations of corruption pointed at it. Maybe you can give me like a greatest hits. Okay. You're like, settle down. There's a lot of stuff there. I mean, basically, I would say that the current reputation of corruption started when television happened and became central to the growth of sports.

22:36when FIFA became basically the rights distributors for the World Cup. So you're saying this started a while ago? This has been going on for, I would say, a half century. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Because the FIFA World Cup wasn't, we think of it as the biggest event in the world now, but it wasn't that at the beginning. It took about 20 years for the FIFA World Cup to become something that actually mattered on a political level, on a multi-billion dollar business level. And the current kind of transformation and reputation of FIFA getting to this point started with the invention of color television and and the distribution of these broadcast rights all around the world where the fifa officials are taking bribes from executives and companies to try to get their hands on the broadcast rights because for these broadcast executives if you get the rights of the fifa world cup it can change the trajectory of your of your television channel at that moment because of all the advertising money that comes in all of the like kind of residue of being the channel that hosts the FIFA World Cup, the habits that people develop of constantly tuning in.

23:38But it does seem like it's worse now. Like it's not just about TV rights. The relationship between Donald Trump and Gianni Infantino, like that's been tight for a while and very much about mutual benefit, right? I would say that the corruption is different. Interesting. How? I would say that the corruption is different. I mean, there might be things happening beyond these things that we obviously don't know about right now. But I would say that the way that the corruption is different is that it is much more explicitly political now. I think that Infantino is a fascinating political figure because he doesn't govern a country, but he has jurisdiction over the biggest sport in the world and the biggest tournament in the world.

24:27And so every single country has a financial incentive to have a relationship with him. Every other country in the world knows how important sports is politically for shaping the vibe of the country, for sometimes distracting people from whatever atrocities might be going on in their country. He's helped, in some ways, the Middle East reshape their reputation by hosting the World Cup, by, you know, the Qatari government, the Saudi Arabian government. They're all investing all this money into soccer. Like he has some jurisdiction and power over that. And yet in this World Cup, you saw stuff like the Iranian national team get denied visas to the U.S., have to kind of decamp to Tijuana.

25:07Yes. To participate. And like it just shows the fragility of having so much power in the hands of a few. Yes. Because, yes, sure. Helping Middle Eastern countries, but only only in certain circumstances. And when Donald Trump maybe asks you to do it differently, you're fine with that. Yeah. And so like there's there's a bunch of incentives that Infantino has. I was at a conference, this Meridian Sports Diplomacy Conference at the beginning of the year. And Infantino showed up and he kind of talked about the importance of the World Cup as this global connecting event. That is their line is that the World Cup is this global connector.

25:44And it is true in many ways that the World Cup is this global connective tissue. It is one of the last monoculture events. So he thinks about it that way. I think the thing that when you see Infantino talk in person, it is very easy to understand how he's able to get on the good sides of all these politicians. He's a very charming guy in person. He has a sense of humor. He's very charismatic. It sounds like you, like, walked out of your, like, interaction like, what just happened? Exactly. Yeah. Right. Amazing. There's like a mystical spell almost that he, like, casts up. Because there is this, like, sense of idealism with sports, I think, where it can be a global connector for a lot of people.

26:25He sounds like a witch. Yeah, but you sense that he does believe it on a certain level, right? But at the same time, you see the actions, right? And you see the way that he's going to prioritize richer countries. Because ultimately, his goal for FIFA, which is technically a nonprofit, is to make as much money as humanly possible. So is Gianni Infantino the problem? if if he was somehow out at fifa would that solve things you've laid out how really fifa's corruption was kind of baked in from decades ago with broadcast rights so i just sort of wonder is he the problem if you remove okay i think it's the incentives that anyone in that position would have because it's just like it truly is low-key one of the most politically powerful positions in the world.

27:12The World Cup is going to bring in a ton of money to the United States. It is going to, in the minds of some people, reshape the reputation of the country in a positive way. You know, sports watching is a thing and it does work, you know? You're saying the best we can hope for is a good witch in charge of FIFA. Yes. But it's like, at the same time, like, sports is only getting bigger. Like, if you have conversations with folks in the VC world and the private equity world, if you talk to people in those worlds, sports is everything. Okay, a big question for you. We talked about how hard the U.S.

27:47worked to get past this knockout round, where they did not get past it. Given that, was all of the U.S. team's work for nothing? No. Why? Convince me. Because they have a much better foundation, I think, moving forward. I think they look like a more serious soccer program now. If you look at, I believe, Seaton Hall or Sacred Heart, I believe it's Seaton Hall, has a sports poll. For 100 people the age of 35, the English Premier League is as popular as the NBA and is more popular than Major League Baseball. There's a massive generation gap in soccer phantom right now. There's more kids who are going to grow up now in a more globally connected world looking at how famous Erling Haaland is, looking at how famous Laminya Maul is or Kylian Mbappe is.

28:37They're way more famous than any American sports superstar short of LeBron James. We should say Holland is playing for Norway. For Norway, yes. Which is confusing. Yes. But he's the guy who looks like a very tall Viking and has a blonde ponytail, if you're following. Yes, yes. And this is Anecdotal Evans, but I think it is kind of emblematic of how much culture has shifted with the internet. I grew up in Boston. Boston is famously a sports-grace city. Growing up, there weren't a lot of people my age who were wearing soccer jerseys to school. And now when I go back home, most of the kids are not wearing Boston sports shirts, but they're wearing Erling Haaland kits and they're wearing Kylian Mbappe kits.

29:18Seems not unrelated to me that at the same time, we're doing this very nationalist close our borders thing here in the U.S. Yes. I think it's 100 % related. Like, I think when you look at the way that culture used to work globally in the past, America basically was the gatekeeper and the decider. And if America decided something was big, the rest of the world was just like, okay, we're going to flood our TVs and our movie theaters with it. The internet has made a lot easier for a small country like Korea to break through because of social media marketing. And even if BTS isn't the biggest band in the United States, you look at the Spotify numbers and you look at the global charts, they're way bigger globally than they are in the US.

29:59And the US not making BTS the biggest band in the US doesn't matter for their global success. And I think that that's what's happening with soccer, where it's just like, for the first time, from a sports perspective, what's happened in pop culture is starting to happen in sports, where soccer is the biggest sport in the world. And it's going to be the biggest sport in the world, regardless of whether or not it's big in America. I think people under the age of 35 are like, we want to participate and connect with people all around the world.

30:29June, I am so grateful for you coming on the show. You were fantastic. Come back again soon. Yeah, thank you for having me on. I appreciate it. June Lee is an independent sports journalist. His work can be found on his YouTube channel, IamJuneLee. And that's our show. What Next is produced by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme, and Patrick Fort. Paige Osborne is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD. Mule Lobel is the executive producer of podcasts here at Slate. Ben Richmond is our Senior Director of Podcast Operations. And I'm Mary Harris. Go talk me down a blue sky.

31:05I'm at Mary Harris. Thanks for listening. Catch you back here next time.

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32:13That means less time on the work around the work and more time finding the stories worth talking about. Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at goo.gle slash workspace with Gemini. That's goo.gle slash workspace with Gemini.