 "Despite his strongly-worded statement, US president Donald Trump does not officially have the authority to decide where the FIFA World Cup matches will take place. Reuters")
US President Donald Trump has threatened stern action in the FIFA World Cup that the United States will be jointly hosting with neighbours Mexico and Canada by moving matches out of the north-eastern city of Boston, Massachusetts.
Trump lashes out at ‘radical left’ Boston Mayor
Trump has expressed concern over parts of Boston – a Democrat-run city in a ‘Blue’ state – getting “taken over” by unrest while describing its mayor Michelle Wu as “intelligent” but “radical left”.
“We could take them away. I love the people of Boston and I know the games are sold out. But your mayor is not good," Trump said on the World Cup matches in Boston.
The matches in Boston will be hosted at the Gillette Stadium, home of the New England Patriots National Football League team that is located in Foxborough, a town located 30 miles away from Boston.
While Trump did not go into the details as far as his comment on parts of Boston getting “taken over” are concerned, it could refer to the pro-Palestinian protests that turned violent and left four police officers injured.
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His comments came after a meeting with Argentinian president Javier Milei in the White House. It also comes at a time when the Trump administration has deployed National Guard troops in Washington DC and Memphis, with similar efforts in Chicago and Portland being met with resistance.
Trump had earlier hinted at the fact that he could declare cities “not safe” for the 23rd edition of the tournament, which runs from 11 June to 19 July and will feature 48 teams – expanded from 32 in the last seven editions including Qatar four years ago.
Not Trump’s call, says FIFA
A total of 16 cities across the US, Mexico and Canada will be hosting matches including Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara in Mexico and Toronto, Canada, in addition to key American cities such as New York City, Los Angeles, Boston Miami, San Francisco, etc.
FIFA, meanwhile, has made it clear that it will not be up to Trump to move World Cup matches out of a city that he deems unfit for whatever reason. The Zurich-based governing body for the sport added that such a drastic move less than a year before kickoff could prove a logistical and legal nightmare for them.
“It’s FIFA’s tournament, FIFA’s jurisdiction, FIFA makes those decisions,” the soccer body’s vice president Victor Montagliani said earlier this month at a sports business conference in London.
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Trump, however, remained unflustered and said that he would simply “call Gianni” (FIFA president Gianni Infantino) if any of the host cities witnessed unrest in the build-up to the World Cup – which returns to North America for the first time since the 1994 edition that was hosted entirely in the US.
“If somebody is doing a bad job, and if I feel there’s unsafe conditions, I would call Gianni – the head of FIFA who’s phenomenal – and I would say, ‘Let’s move into another location’ and they would do that,” President Trump added.
Trump, who is less than a year into his second term as US President, is reportedly also considering similar action against the 2028 LA Olympic Games – with Los Angeles hosting the prestigious multi-sporting event for the third time three years from now.