United States President Donald Trump has confirmed he personally asked FIFA president Gianni Infantino to “review” USA striker Folarin Balogun’s red card against Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was controversially overturned on Sunday.
Balogun was sent off after VAR reviewed a challenge he made in the last-32 match against Bosnia, with the dismissal thought to have meant an automatic ban for Monday night’s last-16 tie against Belgium.
President Trump has now confirmed he personally lobbied Infantino at an event on Monday, telling the FIFA president that Balogun’s challenge “was not a foul” and adding that the referee “is a little bit suspect”.
Trump said at the Oval Office on Monday: “I spoke to Gianni, who’s highly respected.
“I saw the play and I’m a person that loves sports and was a good athlete, and I understand sports really well, really well and that wasn’t a foul, that wasn’t even an infraction, that was two guys running full speed that happened to crash into each other.
“These were two great athletes that got tangled up and this referee, who is a little bit suspect, if you check his past. I don’t want to say that, because I don’t like to create controversy, but very suspect.
“He made a call that nobody could believe. He (Balogun) didn’t do anything wrong and he’s our best player, or one of our best players… and he (the referee) gave him a red card.
“It’s very unfair, you can’t do that. So, yes, I asked for a review by FIFA. I spoke to a man who’s highly respected (Infantino) and by the way, whose level of respect has gone up tenfold.”
FIFA’s statutes prohibit political interference in matters relating to its national associations, but it has not yet commented on how it came to the decision to suspend Balogun’s ban.
Belgium have appealed against the decision to overturn the ban, while UEFA said it “crossed a red line”.
President Trump, who had posted on social media on Sunday to thank FIFA for “reversing a great injustice”, added on Monday: “All I did, I asked for a review because I didn’t think it was a foul, and you know again, I’m good at this stuff.
“If they wouldn’t allow a top player, maybe among the best players on the team, to play, I think it would have had a big stain and I related just that feeling.
“I didn’t tell (Infantino) what to do, I can’t tell him what to do. I don’t believe he made the decision, I think it was a committee that made the decision, and they made the right decision because it wasn’t a foul and you want to see a game with your best players.”
Despite President Trump’s insistence that he did not tell Infantino what to do, Republican Senator Ted Cruz had earlier thanked the President for “getting rid of that ridiculous red card”.
The Belgian Football Association (RBFA) says it has been kept in the dark by FIFA about the reasons behind the suspension of Balogun’s ban.
RBFA STATEMENT UPDATE
Following its previous statement, the RBFA wishes to publicly explain the events of the past few hours. Read it here: https://t.co/uLYfwn22G4 pic.twitter.com/bsZlyq5RAg
— Belgian Red Devils (@BelRedDevils) July 6, 2026
“After learning through media reports of FIFA’s decision to lift the automatic suspension of player Balogun, the RBFA sent a letter to FIFA requesting a copy of the decision, an explanation of the process that had been followed, and setting out its position regarding the applicable regulations,” the RBFA said on Monday.
“As its only response, FIFA sent a letter to the RBFA stating that it considered this correspondence to constitute an appeal, that a judge had been appointed, and that the RBFA had only a few hours to complete that appeal. No information whatsoever was provided by FIFA.
“For an appeal to be admissible, FIFA’s own regulations state that the reasoned decision must first have been communicated to the appellant. While the RBFA was merely seeking legitimate explanations, FIFA itself created an appeal and immediately ensured that it would be declared inadmissible.
“All of this occurred while FIFA simultaneously refused to respond to the RBFA’s legitimate requests.”
UEFA statement on the Balogun case: ⬇️https://t.co/9LQDx8waKe
— UEFA (@UEFA) July 6, 2026
The RBFA claimed FIFA had “deliberately removed the section concerning the automatic suspension of players from its presentation” at a pre-match co-ordination meeting for the match against the US.
UEFA expressed “disbelief” at the decision taken by FIFA and said it was “unprecedented, incomprehensible and unjustifiable”.
The statement from European football’s governing body added: “When the certainty of rules is no longer guaranteed by its guardians, the integrity of the game is at stake and the credibility of a competition is undermined.”
