“When they enter the country, fans must expect that if they don’t please the officials, they will be sent straight home on the next plane. If they’re lucky,” warned Mark Pieth, former chairman of the independent FIFA Governance Commission, in an interview with the “Tagesanzeiger”. From this he made an appeal to the fans: “Stay away from the USA!” He received prominent support from Sepp Blatter. “I think Mark Pieth is right to question this World Cup,” the former FIFA president wrote on X.
Even a successful entry does not guarantee a safe stay in the states, as left-wing parliamentary group leader Sören Pellmann noted at the RND with regard to the ICE authority. “These officials do not look and check reliably who they arrest and sometimes keep in deportation prisons for months.” A passport offers no protection. He “cannot say with a clear conscience that it is safe to travel,” which is why “there is reason to be concerned about everyone who goes.”
Green foreign politician Boris Mijatović primarily derives a mandate from this for local politicians. The federal government must “urgently present a robust strategy to protect German fans and officials during entry and stay at the World Cup,” he told the RND.
No matter where the responsibility for a possible boycott is shifted in the public debate in the coming weeks, the discussions are unlikely to cool down for reasons of safety for fans and players alone. Especially since FIFA itself is not issuing a warning despite the developments in the USA. Instead, Infantino is continuing his cozy relationship with Trump and recently announced that he would present the World Cup trophy together with the US President after the final.
