President Donald Trump’s personal appeal to FIFA president Gianni Infantino may have helped suspend a red card for one of the U.S. men’s national team’s top strikers, but it may have also put FIFA’s credibility on the line and its billions of advertising dollars at risk.
Folarin Balogun, the U.S. striker who, until the contentious Monday night game, scored in every match he has played in at the 2026 World Cup, was expected to miss the round of 16 match against Belgium after he was awarded a red card for a tackle during the Americans’ 2-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina last week. But after Trump and his team gave Infantino a call and FIFA subsequently suspended Balogun’s one-match ban, many pointed to the federation’s strict political interference rules and how FIFA enforced it in the past—and didn’t this time around.
By Sunday, FIFA had suspended Balogun’s one-match ban for a probationary period of one year, clearing the U.S.’ No. 20 to play Monday while slapping him with a $40,000 fine. It was the first instance since 1962 that a red card during the tournament did not result in a match suspension for a player. Hours before the match began, FIFA ruled Belgium’s appeal was “inadmissible” and therefore had no grounds to appeal the decision. Balogun ended up playing in a match that, following a disastrous misplay by the USMNT’s defensive end, saw Belgium with a 3-1 lead before the Belgium national team scored another with less than a minute-and-a-half to go, concluding the USMNT’s World Cup journey.
