Trump: I got red card overturned
Tuesday, 7 July 2026
Donald Trump has admitted lobbying Gianni Infantino to overturn a US red card at the World Cup, in a phone call that has plunged Fifa into crisis.
In a press conference in the Oval Office on Monday, the US president said he asked for a “review”, because he “didn’t think it was a foul”.
Fifa’s scrapping of Folarin Balogun’s suspension after Trump’s intervention has provoked the first major rebellion by leading nations against Infantino, the governing body’s president.
Sources close to talks told Telegraph Sport that Trump discussed the matter three times with Infantino. An hour after Trump’s press conference, Infantino released a statement maintaining Fifa’s decision on Balogun was independent, and unrelated to his conversation with the US president.
Fifa invoked a little-known article in its rules to “suspend” for one year the red card Balogun received in the US’s 2-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina in San Francisco on Wednesday.
“I’m the one that got them to do it,” Trump said. The president admitted he did not know what a red card was but he said the incident that got Balogun dismissed was simply a case of two athletes colliding.
“I saw the play, and I’m a person that loves sports. That wasn’t a foul,” Trump said. “That wasn’t even an infraction… this referee, who is a little bit suspect if you check his past. He made a call that nobody could believe… he’s our best player, or one of our best players. And he gave him a red card.
“I didn’t know what the hell a red card was. When I found out, I said: ‘You gotta be kidding!’
“Yes, I asked for a review by Fifa.”
In justifying his decision to call Infantino, Trump brought up Harry Kane, the England captain, as he explained why he believes “we have to have our best players”.
“How would you feel if we took [Lionel] Messi, [Cristiano] Ronaldo or Harry Kane out? ‘Harry Kane, we’re going to take you out of the game,’” he said. “‘Harry, because you happen to hit somebody a little bit harder.’ You can’t do that. If you would have taken him out, I think it would have really stained this incredible championship.
“We [have] got to have our best players, and Belgium’s got a great team, by the way. We have our best players, and they have to have their best, and if we win or we lose, it’s fair.”
Infantino said in response that “Fifa’s judicial bodies are independent” and “operate autonomously” of his influence. Of his conversation with Trump, he said: “During our conversation, I explained that there was an ongoing legal process involving Fifa’s independent judicial bodies and that the case would be decided in due course by the competent bodies. That is how Fifa’s system works, and it is a principle that I will always uphold.
“I read the decisions of the Fifa Disciplinary Committee when they are issued. Sometimes I am surprised by them. Sometimes I agree with them, and sometimes I disagree. What I always do, however, is respect those decisions and the autonomy of the bodies that make them. Whether we personally like a decision or not is irrelevant.”
The German and Belgian football federations were among those to express dismay at Fifa’s suspension of the ban under Article 27 of its disciplinary code. Fifa has previously used the same code to force through competition amendments relating to Ronaldo and Messi’s Inter Miami. Uefa said the overturning of the suspension had crossed a “red line”.
But Trump insisted that Fifa made a “really brilliant decision” to suspend the red card. “I think the referee’s call was horrible,” he said, before adding that he had asked only for a review. “I didn’t tell them what to do. I can’t tell them what to do.”
Other leading figures reacted with disbelief. Jürgen Klopp, the former Liverpool manager, said: “This is our sport, not theirs.
“If Donald Trump and Gianni Infantino really sorted this out between themselves, it is madness; it calls everything into question.
“These two people, who know nothing about football, should have absolutely nothing to do with this.”
Another European football leader, speaking privately, told Telegraph Sport: “If this is a direct response to US lobbying, this is not far short of a governing body aiding match-fixing.”
Shortly before Trump spoke, Belgium challenged the eligibility of Balogun to play in the last-16 game. Rudi Garcia, the Belgium head coach, said he thought it was “April Fool’s Day”.
The Royal Belgian Football Association (RBFA) said it had learnt of the change in Balogun’s circumstances only through media reports. It has now written to Fifa to request a full explanation of “the process” and “applicable regulations”.
A statement said: “As its only response, Fifa sent a letter to the RBFA stating that it considered this correspondence to constitute an appeal, that a judge had been appointed, and that the RBFA had only a few hours to complete that appeal. No information whatsoever was provided by Fifa.”
Uefa, meanwhile, denounced “the unprecedented, incomprehensible and unjustifiable decision” to allow Balogun to play. Sepp Blatter, the former Fifa president, joined the condemnation and England and Germany voiced concerns about the US president’s call that has cast a cloud over the tournament.
Thomas Tuchel, the England manager, was also bewildered by the unprecedented reprieve after Jarell Quansah’s red card against Mexico, complaining: “Where does it end now?”
Blatter, Infantino’s predecessor who resigned following the corruption scandal that engulfed Fifa in 2015 and was subsequently banned from football, posted on X: “Red cards are not overturned by political phone calls. They are overturned by rules, evidence and independent bodies. If a US president intervenes with the Fifa president – and a player is suddenly cleared before a World Cup knockout match – the question is unavoidable: Quo vadis [where are you going], Fifa?”
David Bernstein, the former Football Association chairman and a key figure in the launch of English football’s regulator, told Telegraph Sport that the Balogun verdict is “absolutely wrong, awful”.
“It hits at one of the beauties of football – the worldwide application across the world of regulations and rules. To do this at this level and with this visibility is absolutely awful.”
Infantino’s future as president of Fifa appears safe, however. No potential candidate has yet surfaced to challenge his re-election next year.
Ashish Prashar, a former adviser to Tony Blair, the Middle East peace envoy, added that Infantino “should be suspended immediately.”
But Bernstein, who criticised Blatter at a Fifa Congress 12 years ago, expressed doubt that Infantino will face any scrutiny by the governing body’s ethics committee, chaired by Rwanda’s Martin Ngoga. “I think this damages Infantino greatly but quite often nothing ends up hurting him,” he said. “It’s like the famous words of Chariots of Fire: ‘We are the committee.’”
Uefa – the head of which, Aleksander Ceferin, is also a Fifa vice-president – issued a statement accusing its fellow governing body of having “crossed a red line”.
It said: “Football, like any other sports, relies on rules, which are the basis for fair, honest and transparent competition. Sometimes rules are open to interpretation. In this case not. A minimum automatic suspension of one match following a red card is not a discretionary option and does not require the decision of a competent body to be enacted.”
The suspended sentence was announced hours before England’s 3-2 victory over Mexico, after which Tuchel said: “Can we overturn it [Quansah’s red card] or not overturn it? Is that something that actively we will seek to pursue? Because, like you say, there’s surely a chance. Where do you draw the line?”
The German Football Association said: “Fifa should now issue a prompt statement regarding reports that the decision to overturn the red card shown to the American player Folarin Balogun was preceded by a telephone call between US president Donald Trump and Fifa president Gianni Infantino.
“The impression that there has been active political interference in sport must be dispelled swiftly and conclusively. The integrity of the competition and the credibility of Fifa are at stake.”
Trump, who was awarded the Fifa Peace Prize by Infantino last December despite widespread criticism, and the Fifa president describe each other as friends.
In his press conference, Trump also took credit for bringing the World Cup to the US as he claimed Joe Biden, the former US president, “was asleep” during his term in office. “I’m the one that got them to do it,” Trump told reporters. “It was not Biden. Biden was asleep. I got him to do it. In fact, it was very sad, because I got him to do it, and if the progression was normal, I would have been retired. Now the Democrats are saying: ‘Man, we should have just let him have his way.’”
Trump’s involvement in the red card row emerged after he initially thanked Fifa for “reversing a great injustice”. The White House official X account responded to Trump’s post by writing: “USA-USA-USA” next to an image of a bald eagle.
There were further claims on Sunday by Clay Travis, the prominent American political commentator, author and radio host, that Trump, Howard Lutnick, the US commerce secretary, and Andrew Giuliani, the head of the White House World Cup task force, put together a team of external lawyers to challenge the red card.
Travis claimed they specifically challenged the use of slow-motion instant replay in awarding the red card and felt this violated Fifa rules.
Gary Neville, the former England defender, told ITV “it absolutely stinks”, and Ian Wright, the former England striker, added: “It is shameful.”
Wayne Rooney, working for the BBC, said: “I think it’s an absolute disgrace.”