BOYCOTT THE WORLD CUP 2026…

By Abiodun Ayegbusi

MaTaZ ArIsInG
Dallas, Texas

BOYCOTT THE WORLD CUP 2026…

Why the World Must Boycott the 2026 World Cup: Trump’s Walls Aren’t Just at the Border They’re Inside the Stadiums.

The FIFA World Cup is supposed to be football’s greatest festival of unity. Every four years, it reminds us that a ball, a pitch, and 90 minutes can bridge divides that politicians spend lifetimes widening. In 2022, Iranians filled stadiums in Qatar with tears and defiance, turning grief into song. Haitian fans danced through the rain in their first Women’s World Cup appearance. Senegalese supporters turned entire cities into oceans of green, red, and yellow. That is the beautiful game.

This summer, in the United States, Mexico, and Canada, that beauty is being strangled before it even begins.a521a9

President Donald Trump’s administration has erected a travel ban affecting nationals from 39 countries—expanded from an initial 19 in June 2025 and locked in on December 16, 2025. Among those banned are four nations whose teams have already qualified for the 48-team tournament: Iran, Haiti, Senegal, and Ivory Coast. Fans from these countries, ordinary people who have scrimped, saved, and dreamed for years, are effectively barred from entering the United States for matches played on American soil. The policy suspends B-1/B-2 visitor visas, the very category World Cup tourists need. Exemptions exist for players, coaches, and “necessary support staff,” but not for the mothers, fathers, siblings, or friends who make the World Cup feel like a family reunion.

And it gets worse. Just last week, the U.S. State Department expanded its “Visa Bond Pilot Program” to 50 countries, requiring travelers from five World Cup-qualified African nations- Algeria, Senegal, Ivory Coast, Cape Verde, and now Tunisia,to post bonds of up to $15,000 just to be considered for entry. Even players may not be fully exempt. Think about that: a Cape Verdean family, whose tiny archipelago has never qualified before, now faces the choice between mortgaging their future or missing their nation’s historic moment.

This isn’t bureaucracy. This is calculated exclusion dressed up as “national security.” It echoes the first-term Muslim ban, the “shithole countries” rhetoric, and the mass-deportation machine now running at full throttle. Trump’s message is loud and clear: certain fans are welcome to watch on television, but not in our stadiums. The beautiful game, for him, has always been conditional.

FIFA is complicit.

President Gianni Infantino has not uttered a single word of public criticism. Instead, he has smiled beside Trump in the Oval Office, unveiled the toothless “FIFA PASS” priority visa system (which fast-tracks interviews but cannot override bans), and repeatedly praised the U.S. administration’s “commitment” to the tournament. In private FIFA Council meetings, he dismissed border-policy fears outright, telling officials that Trump’s insistence visitors “go home when their visas expire” is simply “common practice.” He has defended his “crucial” personal relationship with Trump as essential for the tournament’s success—even as human-rights groups begged FIFA to push back.

Infantino’s silence is deafening because it is strategic. He moved FIFA’s operations closer to Mar-a-Lago. He attended Trump’s inauguration. He chuckles when the president interrupts him to claim top billing for the U.S. hosts. He allowed Trump to steal a Chelsea player’s medal.The man who once preached that football “unites the world” has chosen proximity to power over principle. By refusing to demand exemptions for fans, by refusing to threaten relocation of U.S. matches, by refusing to call out the racism embedded in these policies, Infantino has turned FIFA into Trump’s willing enabler.

The human cost is heartbreaking.

Imagine the Senegalese father who taught his son to love football with grainy VHS tapes of the 2002 quarter-final run. He cannot afford the $15,000 bond. His son will wear the jersey alone in a U.S. stadium while Dad watches from Dakar on a crackling stream. Imagine the Iranian mother who crossed continents to support her team in Qatar, now told her presence is a security risk. Imagine Haitian families,vibrant, joyful, resilient, once again reminded that some passports are worth less than others.

These are not abstract statistics. These are people whose passion fills stadiums, whose songs create atmosphere, whose presence turns a sporting event into a global conversation. Without them, the World Cup in America becomes a hollow corporate spectacle, expensive tickets, corporate hospitality, and carefully screened crowds. Football without the fans it claims to celebrate.

Countries that value dignity, inclusion, and the true spirit of the game have a moral duty to act. Boycott the 2026 World Cup. Withdraw your teams. Refuse to send delegations. Tell FIFA and the co-hosts that you will not lend legitimacy to an event that excludes fans based on nationality, skin color, or passport. Demand that matches in the United States be relocated or that the entire tournament be reassigned if the bans remain.

Some will call this extreme. They will say “politics has no place in sport.” But politics is already in the stadium, weaponized at the border, enforced by visa and ICE officers, and cheered on by a president who sees the World Cup as another stage for his agenda. Silence is complicity. Participation is endorsement.

The World Cup belongs to everyone or it belongs to no one. If Trump’s America cannot welcome the world, then the world should refuse to play in Trump’s America. Let Infantino explain to billions why the “greatest show on earth” now requires a loyalty test at passport control.

Boycott now. Before the first whistle. Before another dream is stamped “denied.”

The pitch is still green. The ball is still round. But the soul of the game is being tested, and this time, silence is not an option. The World Cup was before and will be after Trump. We must not allow one petulant , incontrollable despot piss into a pool the whole world drinks from.

Abiodun Ayegbusi ©Nero.

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