BREAKING: Trump's World Cup Scandal Just Exploded

REUTERS/Evan Vucci

This is Really American. It is Monday, July 6, 2026. Trump’s week is already off to a chaotic start.

Trump stood in the Oval Office on Monday and admitted he personally called FIFA to get an American player’s World Cup red card thrown out, an intervention so brazen that the last FIFA president is publicly warning that football cannot become “a playground for political power.” His White House also just published a 162-page report attacking the Smithsonian’s flagship American history museum for telling the truth about this country, naming its director dozens of times like a target list. His aides spent the weekend leaking to friendly reporters that he has already picked JD Vance as his successor, a coronation announced through anonymous quotes instead of voters. And a new Forbes investigation puts hard numbers on the biggest con of all: Trump walked away with $3 billion from his crypto and media ventures while the supporters who trusted him lost $7 billion. All of it below.

Before we get to the news, we need to talk about what is happening to American media. Murdoch’s Fox is buying Roku for $22 billion. The Ellison family put Bari Weiss in charge of both CBS News and CNN. Bezos owns the Washington Post. Really American answers to none of them. We are fully reader-supported, editorially independent, and unbuyable. But we can only stay that way if enough readers step up. If you have been reading on a free subscription, this is the single best moment to upgrade to a paying membership. Subscribe or upgrade right now.

TRUMP CAUGHT PRESSURING FIFA AT THE WORLD CUP

Trump admitted Monday that he personally called FIFA president Gianni Infantino to demand a review of the red card shown to US striker Folarin Balogun, and FIFA folded. The governing body suspended Balogun’s automatic one-match ban on Sunday even though its own officials had said the punishment could not be appealed under FIFA’s disciplinary code.

This was not one friendly phone call. Sources told the Guardian that Trump made three separate calls to FIFA starting Wednesday to force the reversal. Trump then attacked the Brazilian referee Raphael Claus from the Oval Office, calling him “very suspect” and telling reporters to go dig into his record.

The backlash was immediate. Belgium, which plays the US Monday night for a quarterfinal spot, is furious. Former FIFA president Sepp Blatter put it bluntly: “Red cards are not overturned by political phone calls. They are overturned by rules, evidence and independent bodies.”

Trump is the host of this World Cup, and he just showed every country on Earth that the tournament’s rules bend when he picks up the phone. If the US wins Monday night, Trump will have personally tainted it.

WHITE HOUSE DECLARES WAR ON THE SMITHSONIAN

The White House published a 162-page report Saturday accusing the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History of “extreme political activism.” The report, produced by Trump’s Domestic Policy Council under Vince Haley, attacks the museum for treating American history as anything other than a celebration.

The report names the museum’s director, Anthea Hartig, dozens of times. That is not analysis. That is a target list, and it follows a pattern. Trump already claimed he fired National Portrait Gallery director Kim Sajet, who later resigned under pressure. Per the Washington Post, the White House has spent over a year threatening the Smithsonian’s federal funding, demanding internal files, and pressuring the institution until references to Trump’s two impeachments were stripped from museum displays.

The Smithsonian pushed back, saying it has served the public with nonpartisan scholarship for more than 180 years and remains committed to doing so.

This is your history they are rewriting. The impeachments happened. Slavery happened. A government that forces museums to erase the parts of the story it finds embarrassing is not preserving history. It is destroying it.

TRUMP ANOINTS VANCE THROUGH FRIENDLY LEAKS

Trump has decided JD Vance will succeed him, according to anonymous White House aides who spent the weekend telling Axios all about it. One source claimed “JD is earning it, and Trump sees it,” while another said Trump has stopped asking “JD or Marco?” and now just says Vance “looks great.”

Notice how this coronation is happening. Not through voters. Not through a primary. Through unnamed aides feeding quotes to an outlet that has drifted steadily toward Trump since he retook the White House, delivered by its most MAGA-friendly reporter. The leak conveniently lands while Vance is promoting a new memoir and touting $70 million he raised for the Republican National Committee.

Trump himself has endorsed no one, and in public he keeps dodging the question. A settled successor makes Trump less powerful, and everyone around him knows it. So instead the White House runs a shadow campaign through friendly media, treating the 2028 Republican nomination as an inheritance to be handed down rather than an election to be won.

Marco Rubio’s allies are already bending the knee, telling reporters Rubio would back Vance anyway. The Republican Party is not choosing its next leader. Trump is, behind closed doors, and you are supposed to find out from a leak.

TRUMP POCKETS $3 BILLION WHILE HIS OWN VOTERS LOSE $7 BILLION

Trump made $3 billion from his crypto and media ventures. The investors who believed in him lost $7 billion. Those are the numbers from a new Forbes accounting of Trump Media, World Liberty Financial, the Trump and Melania memecoins, and American Bitcoin.

The wreckage is total. Trump Media has cratered 89 percent from its peak. World Liberty tokens fell 82 percent. Trump’s memecoin lost 98 percent of its value, Melania’s coin lost 99 percent, and American Bitcoin shares collapsed 95 percent.

The victims are Trump’s own voters. Vadim Fistikan, a truck driver and three-time Trump voter, put his life savings into Trump Media stock and watched $205,000 shrivel to $30,000. He calls it “the greatest theft, con job he has ever done.” Ryan Kenney, a military spouse, invested nearly $100,000 in American Bitcoin. It is worth about $9,000 today. Another investor summed up how Trump’s inner circle sees them: “We’re just poor cattle to them.”

Trump did not lose a dime on any of it. He sold his name to his most loyal supporters, took their retirement money, and cashed out. If he will do it to the people who voted for him three times, he will do it to the entire country.

HELP US FIGHT THE BILLIONAIRE TAKEOVER OF AMERICAN MEDIA

If today’s newsletter told you something the billionaire-owned press buried, that is exactly why Really American exists. Trump got caught pressuring FIFA, his White House declared war on the Smithsonian, his aides leaked a Vance coronation, and Forbes exposed his $7 billion fleecing of his own voters, and we covered all of it without a billionaire calling the shots. Really American is reader-supported and unbuyable, and every subscription goes directly toward keeping it that way. If you have been reading on a free subscription, this is the single best moment to upgrade to a paying membership. Subscribe or upgrade right now.

— The Really American Team