With less than two months to go before kickoff, senior management wants leader Gianni Infantino to formally request the US President to halt all Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids for the length of the football tournament.
The feast of football is now weeks away. Every four years, supporters gather before their screens to savour what many regard as the finest month of the cycle. Yet a global spectacle of this scale demands organisation on a grand scale, and FIFA is acutely aware of that responsibility. In today’s environment, nevertheless, there is rising concern that a climate of discomfort might hinder both attendance and the tournament’s global standing: ICE.
Organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have urged FIFA to guarantee the rights of travelling fans amid concerns over potential mass immigration raids. While such warnings are not entirely new, they now emerge within a particularly charged political context in the United States, the host nation, one shaped by longstanding deportation policies under Donald Trump’s administration and recent incidents that have heightened international alarm.
Since returning to power for a second term in January 2025, the New York-born president has intensified efforts to fulfil his campaign pledge on deportations, frequently wielding the issue as a political lever. As recently as last Saturday, Trump threatened to deploy ICE agents at airports from Monday onwards unless Democrats ‘immediately’ approved a funding plan for the Department of Homeland Security.
According to figures published by The Washington Post, citing ICE data, authorities carried out approximately 1,000 arrests per day in the six weeks following the killing of Minnesota resident Alex Pretti on 24 January. Notably, 42% of those detained had no prior criminal record. For Trump, this policy serves as a lever to be pulled at will.
But there sits also a second weighty figure, whose understanding of matters follows an altogether different course, FIFA President Infantino.
FIFA’s strategy appears to rest, at least in part, on the personal rapport between the two leaders. The Swiss official attended Trump’s pre-inauguration rally, wearing a red tie, and the inauguration itself, and has made several visits to the Oval Office, where he even granted Trump the symbolic privilege of touching the World Cup trophy, traditionally reserved for winners, a term Infantino himself used to describe the president.
His involvement has extended further, with participation in Trump’s Peace Board meetings and, more recently, a publicised appearance alongside him at a UFC event in Miami, shared on social media.
Notably, Infantino also awarded the Norh American far-right politician the inaugural ‘FIFA Peace Prize’ in December 2025, a gesture that provoked criticism among those who questioned its legitimacy. Did he break the rules for Trump?
Within FIFA’s upper echelons, some executives believe that this personal connection could be leveraged to negotiate adjustments to domestic immigration enforcement during the tournament. As per sports outlet The Athletic, Infantino informed senior officials this week that he was open to pursuing such a path and intended to raise directly with Trump the possibility of reducing ICE’s role throughout the competition. FIFA, for its part, declined to comment on these reports.
Publicly, Infantino has maintained his customary diplomatic tone. At recent summits in Miami, he declared that “the world will stop” during the tournament, emphasising his ambition for it to deliver a “huge economic impact” while serving as a celebration of unity under the slogan ‘FIFA Unites the World’.
Stumbling blocks have already presented themselves, though. In February, Todd Lyons, acting director of ICE, made it clear that the agency would not step back. On the contrary, it would remain a “key component of the overall security apparatus” for the tournament, directly contradicting FIFA’s reported hopes for a temporary easing.
For now, the White House has not shared any comments on any specific discussions with FIFA, though it has highlighted the anticipated economic benefits of the event, projecting billions of dollars in revenue and hundreds of thousands of jobs under what it describes as “President Trump’s leadership”.