Trump gets DESPERATE as WORLD CUP BOYCOTT grows!

The World Cup a month away from kicking off in Kansas City, the Trump administration is rolling back what some travel groups have called a barrier to fans who want to come watch.

People who have bought a ticket to a World Cup match will no longer have to pay up to $15 ,000 to enter the U .S.The administration but those requirements in place last year.

The FIFA World Cup is just a month away with the United States, one of three host countries.The Trump administration has announced it will exempt football fans from 50 countries who were subject to a $20 ,000 visa deposit requirement, providing they have valid match tickets.The measure was brought in to reduce visa overstays.Naomi, these $20 ,000 bonds were only brought in last year, but the White House is obviously keen to make it as easy as possible for fans to attend.

It's evident the President's getting desperate because he's scared the World Cup in the United States will not live up to the hype as his recent decisions show.The President appears to be learning a very basic lesson about hosting the World Cup.You cannot just go ahead and insult most of the world then invite the world and then charge some of it a $15 ,000 entry bond all while boasting that it's bound to be an economic boom.That's right, the Trump administration is now quietly rolling back part of its hardline visa plan for foreign World Cup visitors.And yeah, it's not happening in a vacuum either, which we'll get to.

Let's look a little bit wider.You've got a lot of big events this summer, America 250 events, the World Cup coming.I know you recently said in an interview that you had some concerns about the locked up funding for DHS and ICE with these big events coming.How concerned should we be about potential attacks at any of these this summer?

Well, we have we have the FIFA that's going to have 78 Super Bowls in 39 days, 38 days here in the United States in 11 cities.Seriously, that's what 30 days.78 Super Bowls in 39 days.That's a lot.We have obviously Freedom 250 that DHS employees are working very hard for.We're getting ready for the World Military Games that follow right after that.

And then we have the Olympics in 2028.What happened with FIFA and Freedom 2028 is because we were in a shutdown for 76 days and the Democrats were just playing this political game because they want open borders and they don't want to deport criminals just walking down our streets.They put us in a position where we were just being reactive to threats that were facing us leading up to these games.

off part of that plan.Foreign ticket holders from five World Cup qualifying countries will not have to pay the visa bonds if they have purchased FIFA tickets and registered through FIFA's past expedited visa system.And it's still a lot of hoops to jump through for a country that is allegedly welcoming the world.But the subtext here is obvious, right?The administration is second guessing their policy at risk of the alternative, which is was becoming politically and economically embarrassing.Because if the World Cup were tracking perfectly, if fans were booking hotels and numbers, if airlines were full, if cities were preparing for a guaranteed economic boom, then the administration would have far less incentive to soften anything.

But the numbers are telling a different story.

my admiration does not increase at the moment.I would not recommend my children to go to the USA today, to be educated there and to work there, simply because a social climate has developed there.And by the way, the question of what well -educated young people can achieve has been answered quite differently in America until a year ago than it is today.Today, the best educated people to find a job in America.

Association warned that nearly 80 % of hotels across host cities say that bookings are tracking well below the original forecasts.And then if you look at the New York Post they reported a similar picture.Yes the Rupert Murdoch owned New York Post.They're the ones saying that foreign soccer fans are skipping the US, threatening what was supposed to be a $30 billion economic boost.According to them, 80 % of hotel operators in 9 of the 11 US host cities say that reservations are lagging, with some cities seeing cancellations as high as 95 % after FIFA released about 70 % of its reserved hotel room blocks.Because listen, Hotels, do not panic before the World Cup because everything is going beautifully, right?

good olive branch to make sure that this event is a success.But it's a really interesting kind of, you know, combination of how politics and sport have combined.We're also going to see that when the US hosts the Olympics in 2028 because of the way that they've handled or they've cracked down on sort of transgender athletes.So I think this is a really interesting sort of confluence event.

I am very concerned that because of statements made by the president and actions taken by the Trump administration, that We're going to be discouraging soccer fans from coming to games here and that our communities will lose the economic benefits of that game or that they will be diminished.The report that was released in March of 2025 projected that international tourism in the United States would increase 6 .5 percent in 2025 and another 10 percent in 2026.And that did not happen in 2025, did it?Correct.In fact, I have a chart here that we asked the Congressional Service Congressional Research Service to put together based on the Department of Commerce numbers.In other words, we took your numbers and this is the chart.

You all projected 6 % increase.You can see a steady decline.I mean, not even close to 6%.Negative.

But the visa bond problem is only one part of the perception crisis that Donald Trump has created.More than 120 civil society groups including the ACLU issued a travel advisory warning, warning visitors about the human rights situation in the United States ahead of the World Cup.The advisory cited risks including ICE abuses, suppression of speech and dangers facing people in host cities.Amnesty USA put it even more directly warning that fans, players, journalists and even other visitors could face serious rights violations as the Trump administration doubles down on what the groups have called a draconian immigration and anti -human rights agenda.Yeah, they're not exactly softening their words either.All of which contributes to the reasons that fans are hesitating.

It's not a mystery by any means.Donald Trump's policies have helped create the conditions that are now scaring off the visitors needed to make the event a success that he has touted it will be.Hardline visa rules, immigration crackdowns, human rights warnings and geopolitical tension have all contributed to this.

What are the specific actions you would want FIFA or host cities to take to protect the safety of immigrant communities and traveling fans?These are real risks and they are real risks that FIFA has failed to mitigate in the past even though they know about the risks.

FIFA and the United States authorities must ensure that the World Cup does not become a pretext for stifling dissent or expanding mass surveillance.Every player, fan, journalist, and resident has the right to participate and protest without fear of sanction, arbitrary detention, or any sort of discriminatory treatment, and in this case also of deportation.

The Trump administration actions threaten our neighbors and tourists alike, and FIFA has unique leverage to push for change not to whitewash and capitulate.This is why more than 90 civil society organizations, including labor groups, as Jennifer mentioned, including the ACLU, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and NAACP have already sent a letter urging FIFA to act.But sadly, we have not yet to see meaningful assurances.On the contrary, we are only seeing further escalation from the administration with deployment of the National Guard, especially in host cities like L .A.and Chicago.

This tournament should be about celebrating unity and our connection to the world.And without action today, FIFA risks becoming a stage for authoritarianism.

As you may know, asylum seekers, once you arrive in the United States, you have a right to seek asylum.You have a right to go before the judge and make a case.

With FIFA coming into North America, the United States in particular, $14 billion plus of revenue, if the funding giant that FIFA is, is not using that to make sure that the values of embracing communities, making sure that policies and practices are embedded in due process, if those things are not being pushed to the forefront, then it does become very political.

And now the administration is trying to loosen a piece of that system for ticket holders because the economic consequences could be becoming dire.impossible to ignore.And that's the contradiction, right?Trump wants the optics of a global welcome while governing through global deterrence.Those two things don't fit together and most certainly don't coincide with hosting the world's beautiful game.