{"id":288295,"date":"2026-07-06T18:03:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T18:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/288295\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T18:03:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T18:03:15","slug":"trump-says-he-asked-fifa-for-review-of-folarin-balogun-red-card","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/288295\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump says he asked FIFA for review of Folarin Balogun red card"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 President Trump claimed Monday that he asked FIFA supremo Gianni Infantino<\/a> to review US striker Folarin Balogun\u2019s red card<\/a>, which would have kept him out of an elimination match against Belgium \u2014 with Trump admitting that \u201cI didn\u2019t think it was a foul.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t tell [Infantino] what to do,\u201d the president responded to a Post reporter\u2019s question in the Oval Office. \u201cI can\u2019t tell him what to do, but \u2014 and I don\u2019t believe he made the decision. I think it was a committee that made the decision, and they made the right decision \u2014 because number one, it wasn\u2019t a foul, and you want to see a game with your best players.\u201d<\/p>\n

FIFA shocked the world Sunday by announcing that Balogun\u2019s one-match ban, typically an automatic consequence of any red card, would be suspended for up to one year, clearing the US star to play in Monday night\u2019s match.<\/p>\n

President Trump claimed on Monday that he asked FIFA head Gianni Infantino to review US striker Folarin Balogun\u2019s red card. AP Photo\/Evan Vucci<\/p>\n

Follow The Post\u2019s live coverage of President Trump and national politics for the latest news and analysis<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI asked for a review because I didn\u2019t think it was a foul, and you know, again, I\u2019m good at this stuff,\u201d Trump said. \u201cI didn\u2019t think it was a foul. I thought it was two great athletes that crashed into each other and got entangled.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement just before noon Monday, Infantino confirmed: \u201cI regularly discuss matters related to the FIFA World Cup with the President of the United States, and on this matter, I did receive a call from President Donald Trump \u2026 During our conversation, I explained that there was an ongoing legal process involving FIFA\u2019s independent judicial bodies and that the case would be decided in due course by the competent bodies. That is how FIFA\u2019s system works, and it is a principle that I will always uphold.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Brooklyn-born Balogun, who plays professionally for AS Monaco in the French league, was sent off by Brazilian referee Raphael Claus in the second half of the USA\u2019s 2-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina in the round of 32 July 1.<\/p>\n

Claus ruled after video review that Balogun had committed a red card offense after the striker appeared to accidentally rake the back of Bosnia defender Tarik Muharemovi\u0107\u2019s leg and spike his ankle.\u00a0<\/p>\n

FIFA found that Claus and video assistant referee Juan Soto of Venezuela\u00a0had misapplied protocols<\/a>\u00a0by using slow motion to determine the severity of the foul. The referee initially ruled that\u00a0Muharemovi\u0107 had fouled Balogun before being called to the video monitor.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey say they don\u2019t show them in slow motion,\u201d Trump said, \u201cbecause it\u2019s so different. Because you\u2019ll take one little quarter of a second, and you\u2019ll see that a hand is touching a neck, or you see something, whereas when you see it in fast motion, it will look like two guys collided, which is really what happened. They got sort of entangled.\u201d<\/p>\n

The president admitted that he \u201cdidn\u2019t think it was a foul.\u201d AP Photo\/Jeff Chiu<\/p>\n

United States\u2019 Folarin Balogun, right, stands by after being issued a red card by Referee Raphael Claus. AP Photo\/Martin Meissner<\/p>\n

\u201cI read the decisions of the FIFA Disciplinary Committee when they are issued,\u201d Infantino insisted Monday. \u201cSometimes 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.\u201d<\/p>\n

The president also questioned the integrity of Claus, who\u00a0was\u00a0accused of match-fixing and giving out \u201cirregular red cards\u201d\u00a0in\u00a02023, though an investigation turned up no evidence of wrongdoing.<\/p>\n

More coverage on the 2026 FIFA World Cup<\/p>\n

\u201cThese were two great athletes that got tangled up, and this referee who delivers \u2026 little bit suspect?,\u201d he said. \u201cCheck his past. I don\u2019t want to say that, because I don\u2019t like to create controversy. Very suspect, I\u2019ll provide you with the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

Approximately seven hours before the match kicked off in Seattle, FIFA denied the Royal Belgian Football Association\u2019s appeal of its Balogun ruling, finding the RBFA was \u201cnot a party to the proceedings and, as such, has no standing to appeal the decision.\u201d<\/p>\n

Claus ruled after video review that Balogun had committed a red card offense after the striker appeared to accidentally rake the back of Bosnia defender Tarik Muharemovi\u0107\u2019s leg and spike his ankle.\u00a0 ZUMAPRESS.com<\/p>\n

The president also questioned the integrity of Claus, who\u00a0was\u00a0accused of match-fixing and giving out \u201cirregular red cards\u00a0in\u00a02023, though an investigation turned up no evidence of wrongdoing. AP Photo\/Mark Schiefelbein<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you would have taken him out, I think it would have really stained this incredible game,\u201d Trump said Monday. \u201cWe got to have our best players, and they\u2019ve got \u2014 Belgium\u2019s got a great team, by the way. We have our best players, and they have to have their best.\u201d<\/p>\n

The president jokingly likened a potential Belgian victory to his 2020 election loss.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they beat us, we\u2019ll say it was \u2014 I say it was rigged just like the election was rigged in 2020,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I won\u2019t get into that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump has a close relationship with Infantino and is scheduled to hand over the World Cup trophy at the final July 19 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, NJ.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 President Trump claimed Monday that he asked FIFA supremo Gianni Infantino to review US striker Folarin…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[153,11015,35299,9,11,10,87,400,319,33009],"class_list":["post-288295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-donald-trump","tag-fifa","tag-folarin-balogun","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-politics","tag-soccer","tag-sports","tag-world-cup-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}