{"id":81437,"date":"2026-06-03T19:03:03","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T02:03:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=81437"},"modified":"2026-06-03T19:03:03","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T02:03:03","slug":"not-a-world-cup-for-the-world-rights-advocates-sound-alarm-ahead-of-tournament","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=81437","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Not a World Cup for the World\u2019: Rights Advocates Sound Alarm Ahead of Tournament"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By<\/span>Selen Ozturk<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Image via Canva<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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With the FIFA World Cup to open June 11, civil advocates warn that an international tournament billed as the most inclusive in history risks becoming a backdrop for serious rights violations on American soil.<\/p>\n

The United States will host 78 of the 48-team tournament\u2019s 104 matches for up to 10 million visitors across 11 cities \u2014 a scale, advocates noted in an\u00a0American Community Media briefing<\/a>, comparable to staging 78 consecutive Super Bowls.<\/p>\n

That footprint has sharpened concerns about what immigration enforcement, travel bans and a spotty human rights framework could mean for fans, workers, journalists and the communities around World Cup venues.<\/p>\n

In the shadow of \u2018human rights nightmares\u2019<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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Minky Worden, Director of Global Initiatives, Human Rights Watch, gives an overview of her organization\u2019s ICE truce proposal, which would pause ICE actions and deportations during the 2026 FIFA World Cup matches.<\/em><\/p>\n

Minky Worden, director of global initiatives at Human Rights Watch (HRW), set the tournament against its predecessors: \u201cThe human rights catastrophes around the World Cup in 2018 in Russia and 2022 in Qatar, that is the right place to start.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because of \u201cthe human rights nightmares\u201d those tournaments produced, she continued, FIFA had adopted a\u00a0human rights framework<\/a>\u00a0requiring all of this year\u2019s 16 host cities across the U.S., Mexico and Canada to adopt tailored human rights action plans. Worden described the new policy as a \u201cbeautiful yet meaningless document.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 2018 World Cup unfolded against what HRW then\u00a0described<\/a>\u00a0as \u201cthe worst human rights crisis in Russia since the Soviet era.\u201d Violations included a broad crackdown on political dissent, harassment and arbitrary detention of activists and journalists, forced labor in life-threatening weather conditions, unpaid wages and 21 construction-related worker fatalities.<\/p>\n

Qatar 2022 proved more catastrophic still.<\/p>\n

A 2021 Guardian\u00a0investigation<\/a>\u00a0found that over 6,500 migrant workers died during the construction of World Cup venues and infrastructure \u2014 some in workplace accidents, others by suicide, many classified as unexplained. Conditions were exacerbated by dangerous heat, poor living quarters and a visa system that prevented workers from leaving the country. The tournament also drew international\u00a0criticism<\/a>\u00a0for Qatar\u2019s criminalization of same-sex relations and its press censorship.<\/p>\n

Even with this legacy, Worden said \u201cas many as five\u201d of the 16 host cities required to publish human rights action plans for this year\u2019s event had still not done so, including New Jersey, Philadelphia and Miami, the latter where FIFA is based.<\/p>\n

Travel bans<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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Minky Worden discusses the oppression of women in Iran and FIFA\u2019s failure to respond.<\/em><\/p>\n

FIFA President Gianni Infantino declares daily on social media, Worden noted, that this will be \u201cthe largest and most inclusive World Cup,\u201d a claim she said is contradicted by travel bans in effect for 39 countries, including qualifying nations Senegal, C\u00f4te d\u2019Ivoire, Haiti and Iran.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese mega-events shouldn\u2019t happen to a community, they should happen with a community,\u201d she said. \u201cThis World Cup is not a World Cup for the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Iranian team\u2019s situation makes the contradiction most visible. Despite qualifying for the tournament, the players are not permitted to stay in U.S. territory; they will cross the border nightly from Tijuana to compete in Los Angeles and Seattle.<\/p>\n

Worden noted that the World Cup has historically functioned as a platform for Iranian civil rights, particularly women\u2019s rights activists who have used the event to publicly protest gender-based stadium bans and restrictions in their home country.<\/p>\n

Visa restrictions, Worden said, are now denying advocates like these \u201ca right to free speech around these events.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ariel G. Ruiz Soto, senior policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute, outlined the broader, uneven landscape facing international visitors.<\/p>\n

Travelers from U.S. Visa Waiver Program countries \u2014 primarily in Europe and parts of Asia \u2014 face \u201crelatively simple\u201d entry conditions, he explained. For those from the 39 countries under full travel bans, entry is simply barred.<\/p>\n

For others, he continued, the Trump administration announced a World Cup visa bond of up to $15,000 as a condition of entry, waived only for those who secured tickets or travel plans before April 15, \u201cto assure that they will actually leave the country once the World Cup ends.\u201d<\/p>\n

ICE enforcement<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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Ariel G. Ruiz Soto, Senior Policy Analyst at Migration Policy Institute, discusses the Trump administration\u2019s indication that FIFA event stadiums will not be targeted by ICE, but notes that nothing has been said about host cities.<\/em><\/p>\n

While the Trump administration and FIFA have\u00a0agreed<\/a>\u00a0that no Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations will happen at the stadiums nor fan zones, activists have received\u00a0conflicting<\/a>\u00a0information<\/a>\u00a0regarding ICE arrests around the venues. Trump officials have not ruled out the possibility.<\/p>\n

Over 120 civil society groups have issued a\u00a0travel warning<\/a>\u00a0about \u201cserious rights violations\u201d for the tournament\u2019s 10 million potential visitors. A labor union representing over 2,000 hospitality employee at Los Angeles\u2019 SoFi Stadium \u2014 expected to draw 70,000 fans per match \u2014 has\u00a0threatened<\/a>\u00a0to strike if ICE agents are deployed at the venue.<\/p>\n

HRW, alongside the Sport and Rights Alliance and the coalition Dignity 2026, has called for an \u201cICE Truce<\/a>\u201d \u2014 a suspension of enforcement operations for the tournament\u2019s duration, modeled on the Olympic Truce.<\/p>\n

\u201cFamilies, and particularly immigrant families, love the World Cup,\u201d Worden added. \u201cHuman Rights Watch has interviewed people in host cities, in communities that are affected, and we\u2019ve had people say to us, \u2018I don\u2019t care if I get arrested or deported, I am going to follow my team, I love the World Cup so much.\u2019 And when we hear that, it\u2019s very concerning.\u201d<\/p>\n

Katherine La Puente, senior children\u2019s rights coordinator at HRW, put numbers to the enforcement landscape.<\/p>\n

Drawing on data from the\u00a0Deportation Data Project<\/a>, she said that over 167,000 people have been arrested since January 2025 in the 11 U.S. host cities alone, with especially high numbers in Miami, Dallas and Houston.<\/p>\n

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Katherine La Puente, Children\u2019s Rights Senior Coordinator, Human Rights Watch, shares data on ICE actions in US host cities, and discusses the risk immigrants face as World Cup games come to their cities.<\/em><\/p>\n

She described one case HRW documented directly: A father seeking U.S. asylum brought his two children, aged 10 and 14, to the FIFA Club World Cup final at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey last summer. While flying a recreational drone in the parking lot before the match to take a photo of himself and his family, he was arrested by ICE agents as his children watched and cried.<\/p>\n

He was held for three months at Delaney Hall detention center in Newark, then deported to a country \u201cwhere he faces persecution by the very same people who forced him to flee in the first place,\u201d continued La Puente.<\/p>\n

The children eventually returned to their mother, but \u201cthey had been left behind with others at the Club World Cup final that day, just showing another risk that FIFA hadn\u2019t thought through in their child safeguarding policies,\u201d said La Puente. \u201cIf this does happen again, what will happen to the children if they\u2019re forcibly separated from their family members?\u201d<\/p>\n

Last March, FIFA\u00a0adopted<\/a>\u00a0a child safeguarding statement, a step La Puente called positive but inadequate.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe fear that it\u2019s too little and too late,\u201d she said, voicing concerns that \u201cthere\u2019s not enough time to ensure that staff are adequately trained, adequately informed of the risk to children, and able to respond effectively, and we\u2019re concerned that fans, including children, won\u2019t know how to report abuses, or that FIFA will be able to remedy any that come up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jamal R. Watkins, senior vice president of strategy and advancement at the NAACP \u2014 part of the group that issued the travel warning \u2014\u00a0explained<\/a>\u00a0why official assurances that ICE presences will be contained have offered little comfort: \u201cWe\u2019ve seen how that\u2019s played out here in the United States \u2014 in the loss of civilian lives and families being ripped apart.\u201d<\/p>\n

To truly support the fans, players and workers who \u201cbring the World Cup to life,\u201d he said, means resisting \u201cthe political interests of the U.S. government in certain host cities to militarize communities\u201d and resisting the logic that puts \u201cprofits over people.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BySelen Ozturk Jun 3, 2026 Image...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81437","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ca-local","category-u-s-a"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81437","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=81437"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81437\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81438,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81437\/revisions\/81438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=81437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=81437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=81437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}