After FIFA’s decision earlier this month to delay a one-game red-card suspension for U.S. player Folarin Balogun — which followed a phone call between Donald Trump and the organization’s president, Gianni Infantino — you might have wondered if the soccer group’s leadership carves out an hour each day to devise new and inventive ways to look corrupt, or at least one 45-minute all-hands call a week that no one can miss. Given FIFA’s latest proposal to team up with Jared Kushner’s brother to sell stakes in the World Cup to wealthy investors for billions of dollars, an hour a day seems plausible, if not an understatement!
FIFA revealed on Tuesday that it intends to form FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), a subsidiary of the governing body that would control commercial-event operations, including future men’s and women’s World Cups. The subsidiary would be funded by investors that include Thrive Eternal, an investment vehicle owned by First Son-in-law Jared Kushner’s brother, Josh Kushner. Thrive would reportedly “leverage its own investment by courting long-term institutional investors from around the world … relying principally on sovereign wealth funds,” according to Politico. FIFA said Tuesday that it plans to raise up to $4.2 billion this year, giving FFE an equity valuation of $20 billion.
How did interested parties react to the plan? In a word, badly. In three words, quite fucking badly, unless threatening to boycott the World Cup was intended to signal support for the idea. ESPN reported Tuesday night that UEFA — the governing body for football in Europe, and one of FIFA’s six regional confederations — “is accelerating efforts to hold an emergency meeting of its 55 member associations this week … to discuss plans, including a potential World Cup boycott, to oppose a FIFA proposal to raise $20 billion from a sale of equity to outside investors.”
In a statement on its website, UEFA declared, “This crosses a line that football’s governing institutions should never cross. UEFA takes it extremely seriously. So should every national football association. So should every stakeholder: leagues, clubs, players, supporters, governments and everyone who cares about the future of the game. The soul and governance of football are not assets to trade — especially with zero transparency as to who gains financially. None of us are the owners of football. It is not FIFA’s to sell.” With Infantino reportedly issuing a September 19 deadline to support the proposal, the organization responded on Wednesday that “this says everything you need to know about this plan,” adding that “FIFA cannot continue to use our sport to enrich themselves and their friends.” And on X, new U.K. prime minister Andy Burnham wrote, “Let me say this very directly. Football does not belong to investors. It belongs to the people who fill the stands and who stand on the touchline week in, week out, rain or shine.”
FIFA’s Infantino has spent years cozying up to Trump, whose son-in-law was made the point person on the effort to bring the 2026 World Cup to the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. In 2025, the soccer body started renting office space in Trump Tower; the same year, it embarrassingly created the inaugural FIFA “Peace Prize” for the express purpose of giving it to Trump, who regularly complains that he’s never won (a real) one.
Speaking of FIFA and the U.S. government, Representative Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, sent a letter this week demanding information from the organization about “a list of gifts provided to Trump, communications concerning Justice Department matters, and visitor logs for FIFA’s Miami headquarters and Trump Tower office” and has said he’ll use his power to probe FIFA’s influence in Washington should the Dems flip the House this November.
Of the plan to team up with Kushner, the lawmaker told Politico, “FIFA, Donald Trump’s favorite corrupt racketeering enterprise in world sports, is now going directly into business with the Trump family! Apparently the fake Peace Prize and giant lease with Trump Tower weren’t enough — now Infantino performs a kickback hat trick by pursuing a multibillion-dollar deal with Jared Kushner’s brother to sell ownership stakes in the World Cup to private investors.”
Tags:
- world cup
- gianni infantino
- family business
Source: New York Magazine
