{"id":180752,"date":"2026-03-06T13:37:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T13:37:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/180752\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T13:37:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T13:37:15","slug":"inter-miami-messi-visit-white-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/180752\/","title":{"rendered":"Inter Miami, Messi visit White House"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph sections-franchises \">President Trump welcomed Inter Miami and star F Lionel Messi to the White House on Thursday \u201cto celebrate the team\u2019s 2025 MLS Cup title.\u201d The players entered the East Room first. Trump then arrived \u201cflanked by Messi\u201d and team co-owner Jorge Mas. Trump began the event \u201cwith an update on the war in Iran.\u201d Mas presented Trump with a pink No. 47 jersey to commemorate his presidency, then Messi gave Trump a \u201csigned ball\u201d and coach Javier Mascherano and the team presented Trump \u201cwith an engraved watch.\u201d Mas\u2019 entire family \u201cwas in attendance.\u201d Also attending the ceremony were MLS Commissioner Don Garber, White House World Cup Task Force Exec Dir Andrew Giuliani and former MLBer and T\u2019Wolves co-owner Alex Rodriguez (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.miamiherald.com\/sports\/mls\/inter-miami\/article314941410.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.miamiherald.com\/sports\/mls\/inter-miami\/article314941410.html\">MIAMI HERALD, 3\/5<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph sections-franchises \">Messi has \u201cfamously avoided moments that collide with politics and could be perceived as endorsements.\u201d That Messi did not opt out &#8212; and that he \u201ctook center stage\u201d &#8212; was \u201cnotable because, whether he intended it or not, his presence could be perceived as an endorsement of the president.\u201d Inter Miami co-owner David Beckham was not in attendance (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/7092220\/2026\/03\/06\/trump-messi-ronaldo-politics-iran\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/7092220\/2026\/03\/06\/trump-messi-ronaldo-politics-iran\/\">THE ATHLETIC, 3\/6<\/a>).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Trump welcomed Inter Miami and star F Lionel Messi to the White House on Thursday \u201cto celebrate&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":180753,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[123,125,124,5692,2062],"class_list":["post-180752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news","tag-mls","tag-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/180753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}