President Donald Trump is responding to global outrage over his intervention with FIFA during the World Cup. The president said he didn’t initially know what a red card was or what its consequences were, but when he learned it could keep star U.S. forward Folarin Balogun out of Monday’s knockout match against Belgium, he felt compelled to call FIFA president Gianni Infantino asking for a review.
On Monday afternoon, a FIFA appeals judge dismissed Belgium’s
legal challenge fewer than eight hours before kickoff. The Belgian soccer body “is not a party to the proceedings and, as such, has no standing to appeal the decision,” FIFA said in a statement.
Trump rang a ceremonial bell Monday as the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq opened, reflecting how much he's counting on the stock market as he promoted the launch of Trump Accounts for children, which Republicans created in their 2025 tax and spending cuts bill.
And Trump will meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa on Wednesday at the NATO summit in Turkey, as Kyiv tries to refocus his attention on the conflict with Moscow and as Trump publicly mused about Syria’s role in the Middle East.
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The relationship between Donald Trump and FIFA President Gianni Infantino, long in the making, is now at the center of one of the great World Cup controversies, sparking anger, disbelief and questions about the integrity of global sport’s biggest tournament.
Trump’s intervention in the lifting of U.S. forward Folarin Balogun’s one-match suspension has shone the spotlight on his close ties with Infantino. It has led to furor from Belgium — the U.S. team’s opponent in the round of 16 match on Monday — as European soccer’s governing body, UEFA, accused FIFA of crossing a “red line.”
The highly contentious call comes on the back of Infantino’s campaign to strengthen relations with Trump, the leader of the co-host of the biggest World Cup ever.
FIFA’s stunning decision to lift the suspension of a star U.S. player has riled the host country’s next World Cup opponent, Belgium, and sent soccer fans -- and political leaders -- into a frenzy over the influence President Donald Trump may have had over the extremely rare ruling.
Hours before kickoff, FIFA dismissed Belgium’s challenge to the most-debated political intervention in a World Cup in decades. That means forward Folarin Balogun is eligible to play on Monday night in Seattle. A win would send the U.S. to the quarterfinals, which would be the best U.S. result at a men’s World Cup since 2002.
Balogun had faced a mandatory ban from Monday’s match after receiving a red card last week. But FIFA lifted his suspension on Sunday following a call Trump made to the global soccer organization’s president, Gianni Infantino.
In its decision to let Balogun play against Belgium, FIFA cited article 27 of its disciplinary code, which says a “judicial body” can “fully or partially suspend the implementation of a disciplinary measure.” Balogun could yet get that one-game suspension on top of any future punishment if he commits a similar offense again in the next year.
While FIFA didn’t elaborate on how it reached its decision, the global soccer organization’s president, Gianni Infantino, insisted in a social media post that FIFA’s disciplinary committee acted with independence and judged cases such as Balogun’s on “applicable regulations and the specific facts.” Article 27 doesn’t lay out any requirements for which cases are eligible under the rarely used rule.
President Donald Trump said Monday that he’s building a granite helipad on the White House lawn, insisting that the landing area is needed to accommodate new, more powerful presidential choppers.
Confirmation of the project came as construction crews had already begun working on the helipad on the South Lawn, where the president had UFC build a temporary arena for a cage fight celebrating his 80th birthday. He said the project would be privately funded and estimated its cost at up to $6 million.
“It’s got the seal of the White House on it in granite, in carved granite,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “It’s really a beautiful thing.”
The president did not offer details on how long the work would take. It is the latest major construction project he has overseen in an effort to increasingly mold the White House in his own image.
Trump offered his playlist as he wrapped more than 40 minutes of remarks in Washington, D.C.’s heat that was held shortly after an earlier, lengthy press event in the Oval Office.
“Should we put on a little music, yes?,” he asked. “This way you don’t have to talk to each other. You just have to listen to music.”
“So we’re going to put on a little music, the Trump playlist, OK, and we’ll have a little fun,” Trump said.
“YMCA” began to play as the White House press pool was escorted back indoors.
Minaj got a shout-out from Trump as he spoke at a Rose Garden luncheon after an earlier event to highlight the accounts.
The musical artist had joined Trump in January for an earlier announcement about the “Trump Accounts” for children born during his second term.
Trump said Monday that Minaj is “great” and “so respected.”
Minaj has described herself as Trump’s “number one fan.”
In rare comments during a photo op ahead of his meeting with Chile’s foreign minister, Secretary of State Marco Rubio echoed Trump by saying “it was the right decision to reverse” Balogun’s penalty.
Rubio acknowledged that “there’s a lot of drama around” the decision. But he mused about why Belgium would want to possibly win a match “if everyone will argue you didn’t really win it because their best, or their leading scorer was not on the pitch.”
Rubio joked that maybe it was “turning into an international incident” ahead of the NATO leaders summit in Turkey this week.
“Maybe we’ll bring it up at NATO tomorrow or with the Belgians and everybody else,” Rubio told reporters Monday, laughing. “I just hope the match will go on, everyone will be at full strength and the winner will be the winner.”
Calling Sen. Ted Cruz “a friend of mine,” in the Oval Office earlier on Monday, Trump said the Texas Republican was the only potential Supreme Court nominee who could get unanimous approval for the post from the Senate.
Trump talked at length about how the two were “great friends” before they duked it out for the GOP nomination during the 2016 presidential campaign, “but then it came together better than ever before.”
Cruz has been laying the groundwork for a possible run at the presidency again, stumping for Republican candidates in early-voting states including South Carolina. Frequently floated by Trump for a post on the high court, Cruz has said he would decline it, preferring to stay in politics and policy.
Trump reviewed several of his White House renovation projects at a lunch on the Rose Garden patio for his investment accounts that bear his name for children born during his second term.
He referenced work being done to the columns on the Pennsylvania Avenue entrance to the mansion and said he was having layers and layers of paint removed.
Trump also talked about the ballroom he’s building and his decision to replace the lawn in the Rose Garden with patio stone.
“We’re putting a lot of love back into the White House,” he said.
The United States’ 250th birthday carries ambitions to galvanize Americans behind nationwide community-service drives and patriotic brand launches. Well-known U.S. nonprofits hope to inspire a record-setting level of volunteerism, while major companies such as Walmart and Coca-Cola are sponsoring tributes and selling limited-edition merchandise.
But the private sector’s unifying ambitions have been met with a mixed response, complicated by an uneasy national mood. Fewer Americans see their country as exceptional compared to 10 years ago, according to a recent survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, part of a broad decline in patriotic sentiment. Views of the American flag — a prominent feature of semiquincentennial celebrations — are divided by politics, age and race.
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The Hamas militant group said Monday it had dissolved its government in Gaza and is preparing to transfer power to a technical committee backed by the United Nations as part of a U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal.
Hamas did not say whether it planned to take the crucial step of disarming or handing over security to an international force, but described its decision as evidence of its commitment to Gaza’s reconstruction after years of war.
It was unclear if the move, announced by a lower-level official, would lead to any meaningful change on the ground.
The Board of Peace, led by Trump with the mandate of governing and rebuilding Gaza, said it would assess the impact of the Hamas announcement based on “actions, not promises” and stressed in a statement on X that the technocratic committee must control all weapons in Gaza, as laid out in the ceasefire agreement.
Speaking Monday on the morning show “Fox & Friends,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “calls openly for the annihilation of Israel.”
Turkey and Israel have acrimonious relations. Erdogan frequently accuses Israel of committing genocide in its war in Gaza, triggered by the deadly Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel.
Turkey was barred from the F-35 program in 2019, after it purchased Russian-made S-400 missile defense systems. However, Trump, who has warm relations with Erdogan, has hinted ahead of his planned visit to Ankara for the NATO summit that the sales could soon resume.
Netanyahu said selling Turkey F-35s would “upset the power balance in the Middle East, which is ultimately guaranteed by Israeli air superiority and also, I think, by America’s posture in the Middle East.”
Israel’s Air Force depends on hundreds of U.S. fighter jets, including F-35s, F-16s and F-15s.
The president has drawn sharp criticism after financial disclosures showed his family made more than $1 billion in crypto last year.
He says his sons are running the family business, the Trump Organization, while he’s president.
“I don’t talk to them,” Trump said, adding, “I’m allowed to, I think.”
But he also said he doesn’t bother because being president is more important: “This office is a much higher calling.”
Trump also offered a dubious history lesson, suggesting that, as president, George Washington had two desks — one for business matters and another for the presidency.
“He had two desks in the same room,” Trump said. “And so, you’re allowed to. But I choose not to. I don’t talk to my kids about, you know, this stuff.”
The president argued that landing Marine One on the South Lawn, as has been done for years, was tough on the grass. He said the process has sometimes singed the grass or even torn it away.
He added “we’re building a helipad” that will feature the presidential seal and be made of granite.
The plan marks yet another building project for Trump, who has shaped the White House and its grounds in his own image in myriad ways.
Asked whether SpaceX shares would be donated for use in Trump Accounts, the president instead talked about how TikTok helped him become president again.
Citing a news segment about the social media app’s purported dangers, Trump said he had seen that he is “No. 1 on it,” then questioned how dangerous it could actually be.
“I think it helped me win the election in a landslide, if you want to know the truth,” he said.
As for SpaceX, Trump said he’s “a cheerleader for geniuses” and speaks to many of them, including Elon Musk, who founded the rocketmaking company.
Asked about his role in getting Balogun’s red-card penalty suspended, Trump acknowledged calling Infantino and asking that FIFA take a second look.
The president said he didn’t initially know what a red card was or what its consequences were. When he found out that it could keep Balogun out of Monday’s match against Belgium, Trump said he felt compelled to intervene.
“All I did was ask for a review,” Trump said to press at the White House. “I didn’t think it was a foul,” he added. “I thought it was two great athletes that crashed each other and got entangled.”
He said the red card was a “horrible” call, arguing that the slowed-down video review made it look worse than it was.
“That’s very unfair,” he said. “How do you penalize them for a game that hasn’t been played?”
“Capitalism” has been the word du jour of the Trump Accounts event, with speakers talking about how the investment vehicles will energize children about financial investing.
But Trump found a way to weave in a reference to the opposing socioeconomic system of communism — applying the label to the Democratic socialist candidates whose primary wins have energized many anti-Trump voters.
Asked by a reporter if the program would go down as one of his “signature policy achievements,” Trump took the opportunity to accuse these candidates in the upcoming midterm elections of being “communists” who “want to destroy our country.” The rhetoric is reminiscent of similar narratives he has employed throughout his political career.
Speaking alongside the president, Sen. Ted Cruz began his remarks by thanking Trump for working to get FIFA to reverse Balogun’s red card penalty of a one-game suspension.
“On behalf of all Americans, thank you for getting rid of that ridiculous red card,” Cruz said. “It was spectacular. There was a reason the FIFA trophy sat here for as long as it did.”
Cruz appeared to be referring to a White House visit by FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who in a rare move brought the World Cup trophy.
Trump thanked FIFA over the weekend after he and the White House intervened to enable Balogun to play in Monday’s match against Belgium.
“I think we’re getting much closer than people realize. And President Putin wants it to end, I will tell you that very strongly,” Trump said Monday while talking to press at the White House. He added that Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also wants to end the war “now.”
The war and efforts to end it are forecast to be a central topic at the upcoming NATO summit this week. Trump plans to meet with Zelenskyy at the meeting in Turkey.
“I think we’re going to get it ended,” Trump said. “It’s been a terrible situation.”
To the children assembled for the investment accounts event, Sen. Ted Cruz tried to break down the stakes in a way they might grasp: McDonalds.
Referencing a brand no doubt recognizable to all of them, the Texas senator said the Trump Accounts and their stock market investments mean the children could go into the restaurant knowing they “now own a little bit of McDonalds.”
Cruz made a similar reference for the kids, feeling a different connection to aeronautics manufacturer Boeing, the next time they fly in an airplane.
Yes, thanks to contributions from some of the country’s wealthiest investors and executives.
Dell Technologies founder Michael Dell and his wife, Susan, pledged to give $6.25 billion targeted so children 10 or under can get $250 in seed money if they live in ZIP codes with a median family income of $150,000 or less.
Trump announced that Sanjay Mehrotra, CEO of Micron Technology, would give $250 million. Hedge fund founder Ray Dalio and his wife, Barbara, pledged $75 million so kids under 10 in qualifying ZIP codes in Connecticut can get $250. And Trump said investor Brad Gerstner would donate $250 to Trump Accounts for every child under 5 in Indiana.
Corporations are being urged to add such contributions to their benefits packages through what Bessent calls the “50 State Challenge.”
The president preemptively waved away potential questions from the press about the White House’s involvement in getting FIFA to reverse a red card against U.S. star Folarin Balogun.
After introducing the press at an Oval Office event on Monday, Trump said: “They don’t want to know anything about soccer slash football. Fortunately, they won’t be asking any questions on that. Nobody cares about that, right?”
Trump said he wanted to keep attention on his administration’s new investment accounts for U.S. children, the topic of Monday’s Oval Office event.
Critics point out that the accounts do little to help children in their early years, when they’re most vulnerable and most likely to be in poverty. The accounts, they say, also fail to offset the cuts the Trump administration and congressional Republicans have made to other programs that benefit young people and the adults in their lives, including food assistance and Medicaid.
And even with government contributions, critics say the Trump Accounts will widen the wealth gap. Affluent families that can afford to make the maximum pretax contributions will realize the greatest benefits. Poor families that can’t afford to set aside money for the accounts will benefit the least. Assuming a 7% annual return, the $1,000 in seed money would grow to roughly $3,570 over 18 years.
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Ahead of the president ringing the market bell, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent gave an overview of the program so far.
He said that 86% of the 6 million signed up came from families earning less than $200,000.
Under the program, parents can open special investment accounts for any child born during Trump’s second term and automatically receive $1,000 from the government. Accounts can be opened for older children — as long as they don’t turn 18 before the end of the calendar year — but they will not receive the $1,000. The accounts were set to open for deposits July 4, which was also the day the Treasury Department plans to transfer the $1,000 bonus.
Trading had begun just before Trump rang the ceremonial bell brought to the Oval Office to mark the opening of trading in U.S. markets on Monday.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said it was the first time the opening bell had been rung in the Oval Office. Trump joked that he wanted to keep the large, silver bell for the White House.
A crowd gathered in the Oval Office to watch as Trump rang the bell, including a group of children who were visibly — and vocally — excited to be there.
Someone whispered “be quiet” to a child who began speaking just as the president was launching into an intro about the importance of the moment.
The Oval Office bell-ringing is aimed at promoting the launch of Trump Accounts, which were created as a vehicle for children to have investments in stock indexes as part of Republicans’ big 2025 tax and spending cuts bill.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has emphasized that millions of people — 38% of American adults have no direct exposure to stocks, so don’t immediately benefit from investments that largely accrue to more affluent households — “but with Trump Accounts, over time, we can get that number down to zero.”
The S&P 500 posted gains of 17.9% in 2025, after annual returns of 25% in 2024 and 26.3% in 2023 under President Joe Biden. The benchmark stock index has risen roughly 10% so far this year. But just as inflation crushed public support for Biden, Trump has also seen his approval fall as his tariffs and the start of the war in Iran created new inflationary pressures.
Trump rang the opening bells for the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq from the golden confines of the Oval Office on Monday, a symbolic act that reflects how he has increasingly tied his presidency to the stock market.
With high inflation hurting Trump’s popularity, the Republican president has tried to get more Americans to focus on their 401(k) investments, claiming that his policies should get the credit for any gains, particularly as the November midterm elections draw closer.
Only 33% of U.S. adults approve of Trump’s economic leadership, according to a June survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
Trump may be preparing to install his own team at the Smithsonian Institution after a White House report branded its leadership, especially at the National Museum of American History, as radical activists who cannot be trusted.
Trump already revealed his intention to force changes at the Smithsonian with an executive order targeting funding for programs advancing what he called “divisive narratives” and “improper ideology.”
Historian Lonnie Bunch, the Smithsonian’s current secretary, is the first African American to lead the institution. In an unrelated interview that aired Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Bunch said “America’s greatest strength, it’s not running away from its history, but it’s understanding how that history shaped us and continues to shape us.”
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Trump got what he wanted from NATO at last year’s summit: an alliance whose members had largely acceded to his demands to step up their defense spending.
This week, when he meets leaders in Turkey, his mission is to enforce that pledge.
The speed with which most NATO countries have tried to heed Trump’s call to spend 5% of their annual gross domestic product on defense over the next decade underscores how the U.S. president has reshaped the alliance and bent it to his will — even as he continues to spar with its members over the Iran war, his flirtation with annexing Greenland, and various personal tiffs.
Trump leaves Monday evening for the summit, and for days leading up to the trip has been airing grievances about how much the U.S. spends on defense compared with other countries. That’s despite efforts from Mark Rutte, the alliance’s secretary-general, who tried to feed the ego of the tempestuous U.S. leader in an Oval Office meeting last month.
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Trump on Sunday posted a falsified image of former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, waving before boarding an Air Force One that had been spray-painted with graffiti.
It came months after another racist post by the president that showed the couple as primates in a jungle. That one was deleted after stiff, bipartisan backlash.
The latest image shows the Obamas smiling and waving at the top of stairs alongside a baby blue and white presidential plane with graffiti painted on it that included the Democrat’s campaign slogan “Yes We Can,” “Obama” and “BLM,” short for Black Lives Matter. The post also shows graffiti in Arabic on the plane that says the phrase “alhamdulillah,” which means “praise be to God” or “thank God.”
Trump has a yearslong record of intensely personal criticism of the Obamas, and of using incendiary, sometimes racist, rhetoric. That includes everything from feeding the lie that Obama was not born in the United States to crude generalizations about majority-Black countries and posts that have sparked anger on his Truth Social website.
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The Trump administration will not seek new bids to repair the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said Sunday as he faced new questions about the troubled project and the taxpayer money involved.
Like Trump, Burgum said he was 100% sure that vandals caused the damage to the century-old Reflecting Pool on the National Mall. Trump has charged that a 350-foot gash was cut into the pool’s liner in the midst of recent renovations, while Burgum described it as multiple cuts adding up to that figure. He also said the pool would have to be at least partially drained in the coming week to finish the repairs.
The repairs will not be opened up to new contractors, he said.
“We’ll use the same company, because they did a fantastic job,” Burgum told CNN’s “State of the Union.” “Thankfully, the vandalism was small. It was bad. I mean, it could cost tens of thousands of dollars to repair, so then it could fall into a felony ... just like damaging any other government property could. But the job that was done to fix the Reflecting Pool was done extremely well.”
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President Donald Trump plans to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa on Wednesday while attending the NATO summit in Turkey, the White House said. Those discussions will come as Kyiv tries to refocus Trump’s attention on the conflict with Moscow and as Trump has publicly mused about Syria’s role in the Middle East.
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly confirmed the meetings in a call with reporters while previewing the upcoming summit in Ankara, where Trump also plans to meet with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday. Before returning to the United States on Wednesday, Trump is scheduled to have a news conference, Kelly said.
Trump’s meeting with Zelenskyy comes as Russia’s war in Ukraine is now in its fifth year. Both Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin held phone calls with Trump on Saturday, congratulating him on the July Fourth commemoration of the 250th anniversary of American independence.
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