{"id":208510,"date":"2026-03-07T04:36:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T04:36:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/208510\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T04:36:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T04:36:10","slug":"galaxys-champions-cup-foe-may-be-short-10-players-due-to-visa-woes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/208510\/","title":{"rendered":"Galaxy’s Champions Cup foe may be short 10 players due to visa woes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The State Department has denied visas for members of a Jamaican soccer team scheduled to play the Galaxy<\/a> on Wednesday in the round of 16 of the CONCACAF Champions Cup, raising concerns that the Trump administration could bar players from traveling<\/a> to the U.S. for this summer\u2019s World Cup as well.<\/p>\n

A CONCACAF source with knowledge of the issue not authorized to discuss it publicly said the organization was aware of the problem and working with the team to appeal the decision. The Champions Cup is the most prestigious club tournament in CONCACAF, the 41-nation FIFA confederation that governs soccer in North America, Central America and the Caribbean.<\/p>\n

Mount Pleasant FA, champion of last year\u2019s CONCACAF Caribbean Cup and runner-up in the last two Jamaican Premier League tournaments, is playing in the Champions Cup for the first time. The team has six Haitian players on its roster, and Haiti is one of 19 countries whose citizens have been banned from entering the U.S by the Trump administration. Citizens from an additional 20 countries faced partial restrictions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis decision raises serious concern about the administration\u2019s willingness to abide by its own agreement and statements regarding the issuance of visas for the World Cup,\u201d said David J. Bier, director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute. \u201cThe president\u2019s proclamation clearly exempts athletes and necessary support personnel for \u2018major sporting events.\u2019 But apparently, this exception is not being applied in all cases.\u201d<\/p>\n

The State Department has the ability, under the Presidential Proclamation exception, to grant entry to \u201cathletes, coaches and essential support staff\u201d from any country traveling to the U.S. for \u201cthe World Cup, Olympics or other major sporting event as determined by the secretary of state.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite that, eight members of Cuba\u2019s delegation to the World Baseball Classic \u2014 among them federation president Juan Reinaldo P\u00e9rez Pardo and pitching coach Pedro Luis Lazo \u2014 had their visa requests denied. Under the Trump administration\u2019s rules, Cuban citizens are subject to the same travel restrictions as Haitians.<\/p>\n

However, Haiti and Jamaica were able to play in last summer\u2019s Gold Cup soccer tournament in the U.S. without issue. The State Department did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

The CONCACAF source said the confederation hopes to reach an agreement with the State Department but added that Mount Pleasant\u2019s game with the Galaxy will go forward either way. The club, which is scheduled to depart Sunday, told a Jamaican newspaper that up to 10 players have been denied visas and coming to Los Angeles without them would require it to rely on seven or eight players from the team\u2019s youth academy to fill out the roster.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want to just show up for the game, we want to be able to compete, but we are not being given the opportunity to be at our best,\u201d Paul Christie, the team\u2019s sporting director, told the Jamaica Observer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The teams will meet in the second and deciding leg of the two-game playoff March 19 at National Stadium in Kingston, Jamaica. Mount Pleasant is expected to be at full strength for that game.<\/p>\n

The State Department\u2019s approach to the visa requests for the Cuban baseball delegation and Jamaican soccer team raise questions about how the Trump administration will handle visa requests<\/a> ahead of this summer\u2019s World Cup. Four tournament qualifiers are impacted by the administration\u2019s travel restrictions, with citizens of Iran \u2014 a country with which the U.S. is at war \u2014 and Haiti facing a total ban, and those from Senegal and Ivory Coast subject to severe restrictions.<\/p>\n

Members of Iran\u2019s delegation were refused entry to the U.S. for December\u2019s World Cup draw in Washington, during which FIFA president Gianni Infantino presented President Trump with the FIFA Peace Prize<\/a>. And last summer, Senegal\u2019s women\u2019s basketball team was forced to cancel a 10-day training camp in the U.S. when visa requests for five players, six staff members and a ministerial delegation were rejected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The State Department has denied visas for members of a Jamaican soccer team scheduled to play the Galaxy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208511,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[1765,96093,7363,96094,18067,57096,48,52,51,47,50,49,96092,9442,8860,5931,427,1695,2281,96091,5393],"class_list":["post-208510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-citizen","tag-concacaf-source","tag-country","tag-delegation","tag-entry","tag-haiti","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-mount-pleasant-fa","tag-player","tag-state-department","tag-summer","tag-team","tag-trump-administration","tag-u-s","tag-visa-request","tag-world-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208510"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208510\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}