Andrew Giuliani, the former aide to US President Donald Trump and former executive director of the White House task force for the 2026 World Cup, has come out swinging in defence of FIFA president Gianni Infantino. Anyone thinking of ousting him, he says, "needs a mental examination".
Giuliani worked closely with Infantino before and during this summer's tournament, and he wasted no time backing him amid the ongoing row over the scrapped "FIFA Forward Enterprise" plan.
Speaking to American website "The Independent", Giuliani put the criticism aimed at Infantino down to jealousy and political calculation. "It's politics," he said. "I've seen this before when they targeted President Trump from a political perspective. People feel jealous when others achieve great accomplishments. And what Gianni Infantino has done for FIFA is that he has taken it to a whole new level they didn't think was possible."
The 2026 World Cup, his own vision
The 2026 World Cup matters most, Giuliani argued, because it is the first tournament shaped entirely by Infantino's own vision. "You have to remember that this is the first World Cup that Gianni Infantino has succeeded in winning the hosting rights for during his presidency," he said. "He inherited the Russia and Qatar tournaments and did a good job managing them, but this is the first one, it's his own vision."
His warning to the presidents of the national and continental federations was blunt. "What I would like to say is that any federation president thinking of not voting for Gianni Infantino, that would be one of the most foolish decisions of his professional life."
Record numbers and a defence of the mistakes
Giuliani also hailed the organisational and financial success of the last tournament. "This man has just organised the biggest global sporting event ever without any incidents, and generated revenues more than four times higher than those of the last World Cup," he said.
He went further: "You are thinking of ousting him. If Gianni is not re-elected unanimously, then everyone who voted against him needs a mental examination."
Mocking the crisis, Giuliani suggested FIFA "may need a FIFA rescue act" along the lines of the "America Rescue Act" that Trump previously proposed.
Like Trump, Giuliani insisted he had no knowledge of the FFE proposal before the media published it, and he urged Infantino's critics to be patient and judge the full career.
The two men have spoken since the controversy erupted, Giuliani revealed, and he believes Infantino has a good plan over the coming months and up to March of next year to win re-election for a new term.
On FIFA's controversial proposal, Giuliani said: "We are all human, and I think Gianni made his statement about this matter recently, but I see this as one of those things that people noticed, where sport has become a subject of profit and commercial marketing."
He concluded: "You have to look at the totality of Gianni's achievements, and recognise that he is always striving to improve his organisation. Just because you are always striving to improve doesn't mean you won't make a mistake here or there. As a human being, that can happen, but I look at the totality of his achievements and say: this is the person I want in charge."