Old haunts

• FIFA’s legal exposure in the United States. The U.S. Department of Justice spent a decade prosecuting FIFA corruption, unsealing indictments in 2015 that eventually charged more than 50 officials and executives across 20 countries for racketeering, wire fraud, and money laundering. In July 2025, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated bribery convictions that a lower court had thrown out—a ruling that affirmed DOJ’s authority to prosecute foreign commercial bribery when it touches U.S. financial infrastructure. The investigation centered on CONCACAF, FIFA’s North American confederation, and the prosecutions remain formally open. FIFA has obvious interests in a cooperative Justice Department.
• The Trump Tower symmetry. CONCACAF once ran its operations out of Trump Tower. Its general secretary, Chuck Blazer, kept a US$18,000-a-month apartment on the 49th floor—plus an adjoining $6,000-a-month unit for his cats. In 2011, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation confronted Blazer outside the building; he became their informant, wearing a wire to meetings with FIFA officials. His recordings helped trigger the 2015 indictments. Now FIFA has opened an office in the same building, announced at a ceremony with Eric Trump in July. As Inside World Football put it, “They say criminals always return to the scene of the crime.”
• The hosting stakes. The 2026 World Cup will be the largest in history—48 teams, 104 matches, 16 cities across three countries. The United States hosts 11 of those cities and both finals. Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill”—the omnibus spending legislation the U.S. Congress passed this summer—allocated $625 million in federal security funding. His administration controls visa processing for fans from 211 member nations, 19 of which currently face U.S. travel bans—including Iran, which has already qualified. FIFA needs smooth logistics. The White House task force, chaired by Trump and run by Andrew Giuliani, controls them.
• The Kennedy Center capture. The venue itself tells a story. In February, Trump fired half the Kennedy Center’s board, installed loyalists including his chief of staff Susie Wiles and second lady Usha Vance, and named himself chairman—the first president ever to do so. He replaced its president with Ric Grenell, a longtime ally. A leaked contract showed FIFA received the Concert Hall essentially free, in exchange for a $2.4 million donation and unspecified “sponsorship opportunities.” An institution captured by Trump hosted an event for an institution performing loyalty to Trump.
• Internal resistance overridden. Infantino didn’t consult his own governing body. The FIFA Council—eight vice presidents and 28 members—learned of the Peace Prize from a press release. In May, when Infantino arrived three hours late to FIFA’s annual congress after traveling with Trump to Qatar, UEFA officials walked out. The European confederation issued a statement calling the delay “deeply regrettable” and accusing Infantino of putting “private political interests” above the game. The criticism hasn’t slowed him down.
• The ‘Make America Great Again’ video. On the eve of Trump’s inauguration in January, Infantino posted a video message: “Together we will make not only America great again, but also the entire world.” The advocacy group FairSquare called it a “flagrant violation” of FIFA’s code of ethics, which mandates political neutrality. FIFA’s statutes explicitly prohibit officials from making political statements. Infantino has continued making them—praising Trump’s policies, calling him “definitely” deserving of the Nobel, describing him as “a really close friend.”
• Infantino’s pattern with strongmen. This isn’t new behavior—or even particularly specific to Trump. Infantino has cultivated ties with rulers before—not least with authoritarian rulers: He accepted an award from Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, maintained close relations with Qatar’s emir and Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, and defended the decision to hold the 2022 World Cup in a country with severe restrictions on labor rights and free expression. What’s different with Trump, apart from the still-democratic form of government he presides over, is the intensity of the relationship—and Infantino’s apparent willingness to subordinate FIFA’s institutional independence to a single leader’s interests in ways that go beyond standard diplomatic courtesy.

The sequence here is interesting. Infantino didn’t simply maintain a working relationship with a host-country president—he embedded himself in Trump’s orbit, appearing at events with no connection to football, praising Trump’s policies, opening offices in Trump’s building, and inventing an award for the American president immediately after the Nobel committee declined to grant him one.

The Signal’s contributor Stephen Hanson has a vocabulary for this. He describes Trump’s style of governance as patrimonial—ruling as a father figure who treats the state as a family business, rewarding loyalty and punishing independence. In patrimonial systems, institutions that want favorable treatment learn to perform fealty. They attend the leader’s events. They echo his slogans. They provide symbolic validation. The whole notion of a “conflict of interest,” Hanson notes, depends on a legal order that patrimonialism rejects.

FIFA’s comportment over the past year fits the pattern. An international institution, nominally committed to political neutrality, has made itself a supplicant—not to the government of the United States as an institution, but to Trump personally. Whether that yields regulatory favor, prosecutorial discretion, or simply smooth World Cup logistics—it’s not clear yet. What is clear is that FIFA has decided the relationship is worth the reputational cost. And that Infantino, at least, appears to believe the cost is low.