Category: Politics

DALLAS — The Trump administration has elevated dozens of more complex World Cup visa decisions to senior leadership as officials try to balance FIFA commitments with national security concerns.

In an interview Sunday, White House World Cup task force Executive Director Andrew Giuliani said many high-profile or complicated visa cases have ultimately reached his desk for a final determination.

“Dozens, I would say dozens,” Giuliani said when asked how many edge cases had required senior-level review. He also suggested that some applicants who might otherwise face difficulties entering the country have received additional consideration because of U.S. commitments tied to hosting the World Cup.

“That’s part of the contract the U.S. government signed with FIFA,” Giuliani said.

In light of President Donald Trump’s tough border policies, these details provide a glimpse into the administration’s process of reviewing visas ahead of the largest World Cup tournament in history — a task that’s involved the State Department, Department of Homeland Security and the White House World Cup task force to keep the process moving.

Giuliani defended the decision to deny entry to Somali referee Omar Abdulkadir Artan, saying it was made by Customs and Border Protection and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin.

While declining to discuss specific intelligence, he said Artan had been communicating with “bad actors” shortly before he was scheduled to travel to the U.S.

Giuliani had conversations with FIFA about Artan’s case because the Somali is one of the organization’s referees.

“We talked about it, obviously, right? I mean, it’s one of their referees,” Giuliani said.

“There are some things we can’t talk about,” Giuliani said. “We want all those players and coaches to come to the United States of America, and officials and referees, as long as they’re not communicating and coordinating with bad actors.”

Giuliani emphasized that the overwhelming majority of players, coaches, referees and officials have received visas without issue.

Still, Giuliani said the administration’s red line remains national security. Referencing broader concerns about individuals linked to terrorist organizations, he said the World Cup would not serve as a justification for admitting people deemed security risks.

“The first thing that is so key to this tournament being successful is the national security of the country,” Giuliani said. “We’re not going to let the World Cup be the excuse.”

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John Malkovich, NBA champion Toni Kukoč and the Croatian men’s soccer legend Luka Modrić walk into a bar.

It’s not the start of a joke, that was the scene at the AKA Hotel in Alexandria, Va., Saturday evening.

The Croatian National Tourist Board hosted a boozy reception for its country’s soccer team as it competes in the 2026 FIFA World Cup this summer, drawing a mix of athletes, business leaders, diplomats and Croatian-American community members to the glitzy rooftop of the hotel just outside Washington.

For Croatia, which reached the final in 2018 and semifinals in 2022, the tournament is about more than soccer. It is one of the country’s most effective soft power tools, a chance for a nation of fewer than four million people to project its brand to a global audience and translate sporting success into tourism, investment and cultural influence.

“This opportunity is a huge push forward for a promotion of our country,” said Kristjan Staničić, director of the Croatian National Tourist Board, in an interview.

Staničić said the U.S. has become one of Croatia’s most important tourism markets, with American visitors continuing to rise since the pandemic. American travelers, he said, are increasingly discovering Croatia as a year-round destination rather than simply a shimmering summer stop along the Adriatic coast.

“The FIFA World Cup is the most popular sport[ing] event in the world,” Staničić said. “This will for sure make Croatia much, much more visible these days, and in these next few months. We’re open for everybody, especially for American tourists.”

Croatian officials also spent part of the evening highlighting the country’s growing roster of celebrity boosters. Tourism and Sports Minister Tonči Glavina touted what he described as an all-star lineup of ambassadors for Croatian tourism, name-checking athletes like LeBron James, Rafael Nadal and Kyle Kuzma as prominent supporters helping raise the country’s profile abroad.

The celebrity connections continued on stage.

Malkovich, who was granted his Croatian passport at the event, appeared alongside director Pete Radovich, a longtime CBS Sports executive, to promote an upcoming project with the Croatian National Tourist Board.

Radovich recounted helping secure Croatian citizenship for football coach Bill Belichick before telling a story about a dinner with former NFL player Jason Kelce.

After Radovich told Kelce he was from Croatia, the former NFL star initially guessed his family’s roots were from “Romania, Hungary, somewhere around there.” The next day, Radovich said, Kelce texted him: “Thanks for last night. Great conversation. By the way, I talked to my mom, we’re Croatian.” Radovich said he immediately had a follow-up question: Why not apply for citizenship, too? (No word yet if Kelce has taken Radovich up on his offer.)

As for Croatia’s chances on the field — they’re slated to face England on Wednesday in Arlington, Texas — Staničić wasn’t lacking confidence.

“I hope there aren’t any injuries,” he said. “I think they’re the best. They’re going to the final.”

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Haiti has the highest level of perceived corruption of any country taking part in the World Cup, with Norway and New Zealand scoring lowest (something New Zealand might have to get used to!). These figures came from Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index.

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After months of planning, some griping and a few tit-for-tats, the three top Democrats from New York and New Jersey showed up to watch the World Cup — together.

New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani are all attending this evening’s Brazil–Morocco match.

The TV broadcast captured the two New Yorkers sitting together. Sherrill also joined them during the match.

Before heading into the stadium, Sherrill stepped off a New Jersey Transit train carrying fans from both teams just before 4 p.m. to hold a quick press conference with her top transit advisers.

“This is the easiest, fastest way to get in and out of the stadium,” she said.

New Jersey Transit generated international headlines for its high ticket prices — $150 at first, then lowered to $98.

Sherrill said about 21,000 people booked tickets on the New Jersey Transit system to get to the match. New Jersey Transit planned to carry up to 40,000 to each match.

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Where is the World Cup being played again?

In the northeastern United States, eight World Cup games, including the final, will be played in what FIFA calls “New York New Jersey.” But elected leaders from this portmanteau place are jostling over where exactly it is.

The state of New Jersey and New York City bid for and won the right to be a host city, but New York state officials have become increasingly involved. So politicians on both sides of the river are just bursting with border-state rivalry that can be lighthearted and serious all at once.

The matches, for the record, are at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. But that hasn’t stopped New York Gov. Kathy Hochul from repeatedly declaring that “New York is not just hosting the World Cup, New York is the World Cup.”

There’s some truth to it — most of the fans are expected to stay in and visit New York between matches. But New Jersey doesn’t shrug off such slights because they reinforce long-running dynamics of New York as the bigger sibling and the Garden State’s struggle for recognition.

Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) made avenging this wrong a dayslong cause célèbre and taunted Hochul with social media posts such as: “If you’re planning to watch a FIFA match in New York, you’ll be SOL.”

New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill pushed to get one of the temporary signs hung at MetLife changed to read “New Jersey New York” instead of “New York New Jersey.” On Friday, she posted a six-second video from outside the sign. “For those keeping score at home, the World Cup is in New Jersey. And now the sign reflects that.”

The New York-New Jersey combo isn’t new.

“I never liked it,” said former U.S. national team goalkeeper Tony Meola, a native of nearby Kearny, New Jersey, who was subjected to the indignity of playing under a neighboring state’s banner during his years with the New York/New Jersey Metrostars, since renamed Red Bull New York.

“I grew up there, I played there — it’s New Jersey,” said Meola. “That’s just my opinion.”

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FIFA President Gianni Infantino is working on his third World Cup, which spreads across North America this weekend. His first tournaments were held in autocratic countries with governments willing to splash cash and use the games to sportswash their tarnished image on the global stage.

In America, where 78 of the 104 matches will be played, he’s dealing with something dramatically different — democratically elected leaders spread across 11 host communities.

Infantino at first seemed to approach North America largely the same way he did Russia and Qatar: Win over the head of state and go from there. He went so far as to court President Donald Trump by giving him a peace prize before he started a war with Iran.

State and local politicians, however, had their own priorities.

In America, Infantino has found himself foiled not only by democracy but the country’s federalism — the separation of national and state power that gives local officials unique power. He can blame Thomas Jefferson for that.

“I think that’s just a big difference, even compared to other western democracies, our federalism is a huge difference,” said Alex Lasry, the CEO of the New York New Jersey Host Committee.

As a result, FIFA’s national partners in Mexico and Canada have more say over how the World Cup is playing out in their countries than the White House does in America, a country that does not even have a sports minister.

In practice, this has meant that even as FIFA presented itself as the world government of the globe’s most beloved sport, local officials in America started standing in its way.

A senior FIFA official earlier this year said it was exaggerated to say one person in Qatar or Russia snapped their fingers and things got done, but the official did describe America as more decentralized.

Back in 2023, one of Infantino’s longtime advisers spoke at length about the FIFA president’s public image. “This whole idea of shoulder-rubbing with dictators? It’s not real. Sometimes the U.S. president is Joe Biden, sometimes it’s Donald Trump. Gianni can’t change that,” the adviser told Tim Röhn of the Axel Springer Global Reporters Network, which includes POLITICO. “He’s not interested in politics — only in football.”

But those politics have been creating roadblocks for months, leading up to the first American game on Friday in Los Angeles.

There was a five-member special board in Massachusetts that had to sign off on a license to allow FIFA to play seven matches there, a power it used to extract concessions from the local host committee.

New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill — one of the newly elected politicians who didn’t bid for the World Cup but now has to pay to put it on, despite having other priorities — got in a public scrape with FIFA over transportation costs. FIFA didn’t budge, but the fight was ugly.

When it tried to ban water bottles from stadiums, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani attacked and FIFA backed down.

On the legal front, a quartet of attorneys general — three from blue states and one from red Texas — are now investigating the soccer body’s ticketing practices.

Alas, there isn’t one person Infantino can call to smooth things over. He isn’t the first European to puzzle over America’s decentralized governance, but this 21st-century Alexis de Tocqueville seems to be learning the hard way.

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President Donald Trump’s name was removed from the facade of the Kennedy Center on Saturday, capping off the president’s longtime effort to assert control over the institution, one of Washington’s most iconic cultural landmarks.

In a Saturday court filing to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Matthew Floca, the Kennedy Center’s chief operating officer and executive director, confirmed work crews had removed “all physical signage” from the building and grounds “that purports to rename the Kennedy Center after President Trump or any individual besides President Kennedy.”

Workers, hidden behind a large white tarp, removed Trump’s name from the building’s white exterior early Saturday morning, after blowing past a Friday deadline due to what Floca cited as “weather-related delays.” The tarp remained in place on Saturday night.

The removal comes after U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ruled in late May that Trump’s rebranding of the performing arts center in his own name was illegal, contravening federal law that the center could only honor Kennedy and usurping authority from Congress.

In the weeks since, officials have removed references to Trump on the Kennedy Center’s website, issued new identification cards, edited employee email signatures and rescinded any trademark applications adding Trump to the institution’s name, Floca wrote in his filing. The restoration of the building’s original name followed denials Friday by both Cooper and an appeals court of last-ditch attempts by the administration and Department of Justice to stay Cooper’s May ruling.

It’s a stinging blow to the president, whose ambitious plans for the Kennedy Center included packing its board with loyalists and shutting it down for two years to conduct major renovations.

Cooper, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, also nixed the Kennedy Center’s closure in his May ruling, prompting Trump to angrily announce plans to transfer the institution back to Congress in a Truth Social post shortly after.

“Judge Cooper should be ashamed of himself!” he wrote. “Unless I am free to do what I do better than anyone else, bring this Institution back, physically, financially, and artistically, I have no interest in continuing what could only be a hopeless journey into “NEVER NEVER LAND.”

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