Soccer may be the world’s most popular pastime, but much about Friday’s lottery draw setting the match schedule for next summer’s World Cup has been programmed with just one fan in mind. Never before has the sports governing body given out a peace prize to a politician eager for one, or booked the Village People and Andrea Bocelli to play alongside. President Donald Trump’s appearance on the Kennedy Center stage will be at least his seventh encounter this year with FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who has logged more face time with Trump this year than any world leader. Infantino’s savvy navigation of the American political scene has helped FIFA build institutional support for a tournament facing unprecedented logistical complications. But that success is beginning to weaken Infantino, as the third-term FIFA president faces newfound internal opposition for his over-the-top courtship of Trump. Our interviews with six international soccer officials across three continents reveal widespread frustration with Infantino’s decision to side with Trump even as White House policies cause chaos for World Cup-bound teams, fans and local organizers, clashing with Infantino’s promise to have a tournament that welcomes the world. “[FIFA] has always promoted a very cozy, close relationship with politicians and political actors in a variety of ways, including by having them in their bodies or running the National Football Associations, for example,” said Miguel Maduro, the chairman of FIFA’s governance and review committee between 2016 and 2017. “This said, the extent of this cozy relationship that we’ve seen and and the public character that has been assumed between Mr. Infantino and Mr. Trump is different even from what we saw in the past,” said Maduro. “It’s not that things like that didn’t happen in the past, but it didn’t happen so obviously and so emphatically as they do now.” Our reporting found that Infantino did not inform his 37-member FIFA Council before creating the FIFA Peace Prize this year, three people familiar with the matter told POLITICO. Over the past year, at least three of FIFA’s eight vice presidents have publicly or privately expressed their concerns about the lengths Infantino is willing to go to please Trump. While Infantino has won his last two terms unopposed, when he stands next for reelection in 2027 he will likely have to answer to FIFA’s 211 member federations for his willing entanglement in the controversies of American politics. Infantino’s allies say that those opposed to many of his soccer-related initiatives — focused on growing the game in emerging markets and expanding FIFA’s flagship tournaments — are using his Trump ties to exploit differences on unrelated issues. “If a challenger to Gianni for the 2027 election emerges, it will be in the next six to eight months and the World Cup will be a litmus test,” said a person involved with World Cup planning granted anonymity to characterize private conversations with top soccer officials. “If something goes off the rails or somebody decides they want to make a run against him, they’re going to use his relationship with Trump to exploit the cracks.” THE MAKING OF THE PRESIDENTS Infantino launched his first campaign for FIFA’s presidency as an underdog. A corruption scandal had toppled much of FIFA’s leadership in 2015, forcing a so-called “extraordinary congress” the next year in which members would vote to decide who would complete the unfinished term vacated by the newly suspended president Sepp Blatter. FIFA, comprised of national soccer federations, picks its president through a secret ballot of those members — one nation, one vote. To win in a multi-candidate field, one must capture two-thirds of the total ballots cast, with rounds of voting until a single candidate locks in a two-way majority. The favorite to succeed Blatter was Sheik Salman Bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa, a Bahraini royal who headed the Asian Football Confederation and appeared to have stitched together a coalition of Asian and African nations. Infantino, a polyglot Swiss-Italian lawyer who had spent seven years as secretary general of European confederation UEFA, pitched himself as someone who could disperse the organization’s wealth back to member countries. “The money of FIFA is your money,” Infantino said in a speech shortly before the vote. “It is not the money of the FIFA president. It’s your money.” Infantino and Al Khalifa ran neck-in-neck in the first round. With a clear two-person race, the United States — which had been supporting Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein of Jordan, who finished a distant third — switched its vote to Infantino in the second round, triggering a rush of support from the Western Hemisphere that gave Infantino a conclusive 115-vote total. A fourth candidate, former French diplomat Jérome Champagne, credited Infantino’s victory to “a strong alliance between Europe and North America and the Anglo-Saxon world.” “Prepare yourself well but be vigilant,” Blatter warned Infantino upon his election in a public letter. “While everyone supports you and tells you nice words, know that once you are the president, friends become rare.” Once in office, Infantino’s initiatives were focused on expanding FIFA’s most valuable properties. He converted a ten-day, exhibition-like competition among seven regional club champions into the month-long FIFA Club World Cup. He also pushed, with mixed success, to grow the size and scope of the World Cup and increase its frequency. In 2017, Infantino announced that the first World Cup under an expanded format — up from 32 countries participating to 48, adding a week of matches to the schedule — would take place in the United States, Canada and Mexico. Facing the first tournament in which hosting responsibilities would be shared by three countries, Infantino visited Trump to secure assurances of government support. Infantino went on to win subsequent terms in 2019 and 2023, and when Trump returned to the White House for his second, in 2025, their political trajectories became permanently intertwined. Infantino set out to raise his profile in American life and his relationships with the country’s political class, including through a campaign-style tour through many of the American cities hosting matches for the inaugural Club World Cup in 2025 and the World Cup the following summer. Infantino sat next to Trump at the tournament’s final, held at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium in July, dragging him onto the winners’ platform as Infantino went to award a trophy and medals to champions Chelsea. Trump lingered awkwardly on stage to the befuddlement of Chelsea’s players, who had not expected they would share the moment with an American politician. Other appearances with Trump placed Infantino squarely between a president intent on solving overseas conflicts and punishing foes, while closing American borders to visitors and trade, and FIFA member nations who may hold starkly different views, or worse. Infantino stood quietly in the Oval Office as he said he would not rule out strikes against fellow World Cup co-host Mexico to target drug cartels, and joined Trump’s entourage on a trip designed to cultivate investment opportunities in the Persian Gulf. When FIFA had to delay the opening of its annual congress in Asuncion, Paraguay, to accommodate Infantino’s travel from a Saudi-U.S. Investment Forum in Riyadh, two FIFA vice presidents were among those who joined English Football Association chairwoman Debbie Hewitt and other federation heads exiting in protest. European confederation UEFA — with 55 member nations, FIFA’s largest — attacked him with unusually pointed language. “To have the timetable changed at the last minute for what appears to be simply to accommodate private political interests,” UEFA wrote in its statement, “does the game no service and appears to put its interests second.” GIANNI ON THE SPOT In September, Trump said he would try to move scheduled World Cup matches out of Democratic-run jurisdictions that are “even a little bit dangerous.” Infantino, whose organization had spent years vetting and preparing those cities for the tournament, said nothing. But a potential rival to Infantino’s leadership took issue with both the American president’s threat — since repeated but not acted upon — and the FIFA president’s silence. “It’s FIFA’s tournament, FIFA’s jurisdiction, FIFA makes those decisions,” FIFA vice president Victor Montagliani, the organization’s leading figure from North America, said at a sports-business conference in London six days later. While president of the Canadian Soccer Association, Montagliani helped to secure his country’s participation in the three-way so-called “United Bid” for next summer’s World Cup. (The Vancouver insurance executive also helped bring the Women’s World Cup to Canada in 2015.) He now serves as president of CONCACAF, the 41-member regional federation encompassing the 41 nations of North America, Central America and the Caribbean. Close to Prime Minister Mark Carney, Montagliani has come to believe Infantino has catered too much to Trump for a tournament realized through the cooperation of three nations, according to three of the people familiar with the dynamics of FIFA’s leadership. (Montagliani declined an interview request.) The leaders of the United States, Mexico and Canada will all participate in a ceremonial ball draw in today’s draw. “With all due respect to current world leaders, football is bigger than them and football will survive their regime and their government and their slogans,” Montagliani told an interviewer at the London conference in late September. “That’s the beauty of our game, is that it is bigger than any individual and bigger than any country.” Montagliani’s “FIFA’s jurisdiction” remarks did not land well with Infantino’s inner sanctum. “It is ultimately the government’s responsibility to decide what’s in the best interest of public safety,” FIFA said in a statement to POLITICO in October after Trump’s next round of threats to relocate matches. The relationship between Infantino and Montagliani has further soured in recent months as Trump reignited tensions between Washington and Ottawa over an anti-tariff ad taking aim at U.S. trade policy, according to a person close to Montagliani granted anonymity to candidly characterize his thinking. Montagliani has his own thoughts on how far relationships with government figures should go but respects Infantino’s perspective, that person said, maintaining the two men had a good relationship despite occasional differences. Others around FIFA have their own parochial concerns with Trump. Despite being among the first teams to qualify for the tournament, Iran threatened to boycott Friday’s draw because some members of its delegation were denied visas for travel to Washington. According to a FIFA official, Iran ultimately reversed course and sent Iranian head coach Ardeshir Ghalenoy after FIFA worked closely with the U.S. government and Iran’s soccer federation. Another qualifying team, Haiti, is also covered by the 19-country travel ban that Trump signed in June. The State Department said that while the policy has a specific carveout for World Cup competitors and their families, the exception will not be applied to fans or spectators. The president of the Japanese Football Association, Tsuneyasu Miyamoto, told POLITICO in an interview last month that he was worried that Trump’s immigration policies could subject Japanese travelers to “deportations happening unnecessarily.” Infantino has stopped short of pressuring Trump to make exceptions to immigration policy for the sake of soccer. FIFA officials have said that when it chooses a tournament location it does not expect that country to significantly alter its immigration laws or vetting standards for the tournament, although many past hosts have chosen to relax visa requirements for World Cup ticketholders. Many European countries’ soccer federations, led by Ireland and Norway, have pushed to ban Israel from international soccer due to its military invasion of Gaza. The movement received an apparent boost from UEFA President Aleksander Čeferin, who supported unfurling a banner that read “Stop Killing Children; Stop Killing Civilians” on the field before a UEFA Super Cup match in August. “If such a big thing is going on, such a terrible thing that doesn’t allow me to sleep — not me, all my colleagues,” — nobody in this organization said we shouldn’t do it. No one,” Čeferin told POLITICO in August. “Then you have to do what is the right thing to do.” European countries were set on a collision with Trump, whose State Department indicated it would work to “fully stop any effort to attempt to ban Israel’s national soccer team from the World Cup.” UEFA pulled back on a planned vote over Israel’s place as a Trump-negotiated peace agreement took hold. Infantino joined Trump and other heads of state in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, for a summit to implement the agreement’s first phase. Nothing threatens to awaken opposition to Infantino as much as his decision to invent a FIFA Peace Prize just as Trump began to complain in October about being passed over for one from the Norwegian Nobel Committee. According to a draft run-of-show for Friday’s draw, Trump is scheduled to speak for two minutes today after receiving the Peace Prize. “He is just implementing what he said he would do,” Infantino said at an American Business Forum in Miami, also attended by Trump, on the day news of the prize was made public. “So I think we should all support what he’s doing because I think it’s looking pretty good.” According to FIFA rules, the organization’s president needs sign-off from the 37-member FIFA council on certain items like the international match calendar, host designations for upcoming FIFA tournaments, and financial matters. FIFA’s charter does not contemplate the creation of a new prize specifically to award a world leader, but those familiar with the organization’s governance say it may violate an ethics policy that requires officers “remain politically neutral.” (In 2019, FIFA honored Argentina’s President Mauricio Macri, who previously led venerable club Boca Juniors, with its first-ever Living Football Award.) “Giving this award to someone that is an active political actor, by itself, is, at least in my opinion, likely a violation of the principle of political neutrality,” said Maduro, a Portuguese legal scholar appointed to oversee FIFA’s governance in the wake of the corruption scandal that helped bring Infantino to office. “We need to know two things: how the award was created and who then took the decision to whom the award was to be given. Both of these decisions should not be taken by the president himself.” Infantino fully bypassed the FIFA Council in deciding to create and award the prize to Trump, according to three people familiar with conversations between Infantino and the council’s members. Even the vice presidents who were given a heads-up ahead of time say they were simply being told after the decision was made. FOUR MORE YEARS? Infantino, a quintessential European first elected with support from his home continent, now sees his strongest base of support in Asia, Africa, and the Gulf countries. He won his last two terms by acclamation, after delivering on his promises to disperse the $11 billion FIFA takes in each World Cup cycle. The FIFA Forward program, launched in 2016, sent $2.8 billion back to member federations and regional confederations in its first six years, funding everything from the development of Papua New Guinea’s women’s squad to an air dome for winter training in Mongolia. But Infantino’s political choices may be costing him in Europe, where the sport is more established and national federations are less dependent on FIFA’s largesse. Infantino’s defenders say that European soccer officials, including Čeferin, have turned against him because they see his attempts to expand the World Cup and institute the Club World Cup as a threat to the primacy of their regional competitions. Many in international soccer see Montagliani as the most viable potential challenger, although a person close to him says he has no intention of seeking FIFA’s presidency in 2027 and instead plans to seek reelection that year to what would have to be his final term as CONCACAF’s president. But he fits the profile of someone best positioned to dethrone the incumbent, ironically by stitching together the type of trans-Atlantic alliance that lifted Infantino to his first victory. “Mexico is not happy. Canada is not happy, and that’s because they’re politically not happy with Trump,” said a senior national-federation official, granted anonymity to candidly discuss dynamics within CONCACAF. “There’s that direct tension.”

President Donald Trump intends for the U.S. to keep a bigger military presence in the Western Hemisphere going forward to battle migration, drugs and the rise of adversarial powers in the region, according to his new National Security Strategy. The 33-page document is a rare formal explanation of Trump’s foreign policy worldview by his administration. Such strategies, which presidents typically release once each term, can help shape how parts of the U.S. government allocate budgets and set policy priorities. The Trump National Security Strategy, which the White House quietly released Thursday, has some brutal words for Europe, suggesting it is in civilizational decline, and pays relatively little attention to the Middle East and Africa. It has an unusually heavy focus on the Western Hemisphere that it casts as largely about protecting the U.S. homeland. It says “border security is the primary element of national security” and makes veiled references to China’s efforts to gain footholds in America’s backyard. “The United States must be preeminent in the Western Hemisphere as a condition of our security and prosperity — a condition that allows us to assert ourselves confidently where and when we need to in the region,” the document states. “The terms of our alliances, and the terms upon which we provide any kind of aid, must be contingent on winding down adversarial outside influence — from control of military installations, ports, and key infrastructure to the purchase of strategic assets broadly defined.” The document describes such plans as part of a “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine. The latter is the notion set forth by President James Monroe in 1823 that the U.S. will not tolerate malign foreign interference in its own hemisphere. Trump’s paper, as well as a partner document known as the National Defense Strategy, have faced delays in part because of debates in the administration over elements related to China. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent pushed for some softening of the language about Beijing, according to two people familiar with the matter who were granted anonymity to describe internal deliberations. Bessent is currently involved in sensitive U.S. trade talks with China, and Trump himself is wary of the delicate relations with Beijing. The new National Security Strategy says the U.S. has to make challenging choices in the global realm. “After the end of the Cold War, American foreign policy elites convinced themselves that permanent American domination of the entire world was in the best interests of our country. Yet the affairs of other countries are our concern only if their activities directly threaten our interests,” the document states. In an introductory note to the strategy, Trump called it a “roadmap to ensure that America remains the greatest and most successful nation in human history, and the home of freedom on earth.” But Trump is mercurial by nature, so it’s hard to predict how closely or how long he will stick to the ideas laid out in the new strategy. A surprising global event could redirect his thinking as well, as it has done for recent presidents from George W. Bush to Joe Biden. Still, the document appears in line with many of the moves he’s taken in his second term, as well as the priorities of some of his aides. That includes deploying significantly more U.S. military prowess to the Western Hemisphere, taking numerous steps to reduce migration to America, pushing for a stronger industrial base in the U.S. and promoting “Western identity,” including in Europe. The strategy even nods to so-called traditional values at times linked to the Christian right, saying the administration wants “the restoration and reinvigoration of American spiritual and cultural health” and “an America that cherishes its past glories and its heroes.” It mentions the need to have “growing numbers of strong, traditional families that raise healthy children.” As POLITICO has reported before, the strategy spends an unusual amount of space on Latin America, the Caribbean and other U.S. neighbors. That’s a break with past administrations, who tended to prioritize other regions and other topics, such as taking on major powers like Russia and China or fighting terrorism. The Trump strategy suggests the president’s military buildup in the Western Hemisphere is not a temporary phenomenon. (That buildup, which has included controversial military strikes against boats allegedly carrying drugs, has been cast by the administration as a way to fight cartels. But the administration also hopes the buildup could help pressure Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro to step down.) The strategy also specifically calls for “a more suitable Coast Guard and Navy presence to control sea lanes, to thwart illegal and other unwanted migration, to reduce human and drug trafficking, and to control key transit routes in a crisis.” The strategy says the U.S. should enhance its relationships with governments in Latin America, including working with them to identify strategic resources — an apparent reference to materials such as rare earth minerals. It also declares that the U.S. will partner more with the private sector to promote “strategic acquisition and investment opportunities for American companies in the region.” Such business-related pledges, at least on a generic level, could please many Latin American governments who have long been frustrated by the lack of U.S. attention to the region. It’s unclear how such promises square with Trump’s insistence on imposing tariffs on America’s trade partners, however. The National Security Strategy spends a fair amount of time on China, though it often doesn’t mention Beijing directly. Many U.S. lawmakers — on a bipartisan basis — consider an increasingly assertive China the gravest long-term threat to America’s global power. But while the language the Trump strategy uses is tough, it is careful and far from inflammatory. The administration promises to “rebalance America’s economic relationship with China, prioritizing reciprocity and fairness to restore American economic independence.” But it also says “trade with China should be balanced and focused on non-sensitive factors” and even calls for “maintaining a genuinely mutually advantageous economic relationship with Beijing.” The strategy says the U.S. wants to prevent war in the Indo-Pacific — a nod to growing tensions in the region, including between China and U.S. allies such as Japan and the Philippines. “We will also maintain our longstanding declaratory policy on Taiwan, meaning that the United States does not support any unilateral change to the status quo in the Taiwan Strait,” it states. That may come as a relief to Asia watchers who worry Trump will back away from U.S. support for Taiwan as it faces ongoing threats from China. The document states that “it is a core interest of the United States to negotiate an expeditious cessation of hostilities in Ukraine,” and to mitigate the risk of Russian confrontation with other countries in Europe. But overall it pulls punches when it comes to Russia — there’s very little criticism of Moscow. Instead, it reserves some of its harshest remarks for U.S.-allied nations in Europe. In particular, the administration, in somewhat veiled terms, knocks European efforts to rein in far-right parties, calling such moves political censorship. “The Trump administration finds itself at odds with European officials who hold unrealistic expectations for the [Ukraine] war perched in unstable minority governments, many of which trample on basic principles of democracy to suppress opposition,” the strategy states. The strategy also appears to suggest that migration will fundamentally change European identity to a degree that could hurt U.S. alliances. “Over the long term, it is more than plausible that within a few decades at the latest, certain NATO members will become majority non-European,” it states. “As such, it is an open question whether they will view their place in the world, or their alliance with the United States, in the same way as those who signed the NATO charter.” Still, the document acknowledges Europe’s economic and other strengths, as well as how America’s partnership with much of the continent has helped the U.S. “Not only can we not afford to write Europe off — doing so would be self-defeating for what this strategy aims to achieve,” it says. “Our goal should be to help Europe correct its current trajectory,” it says. Trump’s first-term National Security Strategy focused significantly on the U.S. competition with Russia and China, but the president frequently undercut it by trying to gain favor with the leaders of those nuclear powers. If this new strategy proves a better reflection of what Trump himself actually believes, it could help other parts of the U.S. government adjust, not to mention foreign governments. As Trump administration documents often do, the strategy devotes significant space to praising the commander-in-chief. It describes him as the “President of Peace” while favorably stating that he “uses unconventional diplomacy.” The strategy struggles at times to tamp down what seem like inconsistencies. It says the U.S. should have a high bar for foreign intervention, but it also says it wants to “prevent the emergence of dominant adversaries.” It also essentially dismisses the ambitions of many smaller countries. “The outsized influence of larger, richer, and stronger nations is a timeless truth of international relations,” the strategy states. The National Security Strategy is the first of several important defense and foreign policy papers the Trump administration is due to release. They include the National Defense Strategy, whose basic thrust is expected to be similar. Presidents’ early visions for what the National Security Strategy should mention have at times had to be discarded due to events. After the 9/11 attacks, George W. Bush’s first-term strategy ended up focusing heavily on battling Islamist terrorism. Biden’s team spent much of its first year working on a strategy that had to be rewritten after Russia moved toward a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

A pair of documents laying out the Trump administration’s global security strategy have been delayed for weeks due in part to changes that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent insisted on concerning China, according to three people familiar with the discussions on the strategies. The documents — the National Security Strategy and National Defense Strategy — were initially expected to be released earlier this fall. Both are now almost done and will likely be released this month, one of the people said. The second person confirmed the imminent release of the National Security Strategy, and the third confirmed that the National Defense Strategy was coming very soon. All were granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. The strategies went through multiple rounds of revisions after Bessent wanted more work done on the language used to discuss China, given sensitivity over ongoing trade negotiations with Beijing and the elevation of the Western Hemisphere as a higher priority than it had been in previous administrations, the people said. The National Security Strategy has been used by successive administrations to outline their overall strategic priorities from the economic sphere to dealing with allies and adversaries and military posture. The drafting goes through a series of readthroughs and comment periods from Cabinet officials in an attempt to capture the breadth of an administrations’ vision and ensure the entire administration is marching in the same direction on the president’s top issues. The administration has been involved in sensitive trade talks with Beijing for months over tariffs and a variety of trade issues, but the Pentagon has maintained its position that China remains the top military rival to the United States. The extent of the changes after Bessent’s requests remains unclear, but two of the people said that Bessent wanted to soften some of the language concerning Chinese activities while declining to provide more details. Any changes to one document would require similar changes to the other, as they must be in sync to express a unified front. It is common for the Treasury secretary and other Cabinet officials to weigh in during the drafting and debate process of crafting a new strategy, as most administrations will only release one National Security Strategy per term. In a statement, the Treasury Department said that Bessent “is 100 percent aligned with President Trump, as is everyone else in this administration, as to how to best manage the relationship with China.” The White House referred to the Treasury Department. Trump administration officials have alternately decried the threat from China and looked for ways to improve relations with Beijing. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is expected to deliver a speech on Friday at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California, on Pentagon efforts to build weapons more quickly to meet the China challenge. At the same time, Hegseth is working with his Chinese counterpart, Adm. Dong Jun, to set up a U.S.-China military communication system aimed to prevent disagreements or misunderstandings from spiraling into unintended conflict in the Indo-Pacific. Bessent told the New ‍York Times Dealbook summit on Wednesday that China was on schedule to meet the pledges it made under a ‌U.S.-China trade agreement, including purchasing 12 million metric tons of soybeans by February 2026. “China is on track to ‍keep every ⁠part of the deal,” ⁠he said. Those moves by administration officials are set against the massive Chinese military buildup in the Indo-Pacific region and tensions over Beijing’s belligerent attitude toward the Philippines, where Beijing and Manila have been facing off over claims of land masses and reefs in the South China Sea. The U.S. has been supplying the Philippines with more sophisticated weaponry in recent years in part to ward off the Chinese threat. China has also consistently flown fighter planes and bombers and sailed warships close to Taiwan’s shores despite the Taiwan Relations Act, an American law that pledges the U.S. to keep close ties with the independent island. The National Security Strategy, which is put out by every administration, hasn’t been updated since 2022 under the Biden administration. That document highlighted three core themes: strategic competition with China and Russia; renewed investment and focus on domestic industrial policy; and the recognition that climate change is a central challenge that touches all aspects of national security. The strategy is expected to place more emphasis on the Western Hemisphere than previous strategies, which focused on the Middle East, counterterrorism, China and Russia. The new strategy will include those topics but also focus on topics such as migration, drug cartels and relations with Latin America — all under the umbrella of protecting the U.S. homeland. That new National Defense Strategy similarly places more emphasis on protecting the U.S. homeland and the Western Hemisphere, as POLITICO first reported, a choice that has caused some concern among military commanders. Both documents are expected to be followed by the “global posture review,” a look at how U.S. military assets are positioned across the globe, and which is being eagerly anticipated by allies from Germany to South Korea, both of which are home to tens of thousands of U.S. troops who might be moved elsewhere.

One key figure is missing from the pack of top national security officials crisscrossing the globe to achieve a Ukraine peace deal: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. But that sits fine with the White House, which is happy with his culture war attacks, made-for-TV images rallying the troops and online trolling of MAGA enemies. The Defense secretary has stayed silent on the surprising role of his subordinate, Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, who recently catapulted into the spotlight by leading surprise negotiations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv and Russian advisers in Abu Dhabi. Hegseth, instead, has been stirring support from President Donald Trump’s base for authorizing an investigation into Sen. Mark Kelly, a former Navy captain, who told troops in a video that they can refuse illegal orders. The Pentagon leader — a former Fox News host who seems more at home railing against diversity programs than leading diplomatic consultations — has carved out an unorthodox political niche that has helped insulate him from criticism within the administration, at least for now. “The president expects Pete to rule out DEI at the Pentagon, which he has been quite successful at doing,” said a senior White House official. “The president also loves that.” The Defense secretary position is traditionally not an overtly partisan role, especially since the person works with a military that has taken an oath to stay apolitical. But Hegseth’s tenure has been markedly different from his predecessors in the way he’s politicized the office. He’s antagonized Democratic lawmakers on social media, huddled with conservative activists such as Laura Loomer in his office, and stacked a new hand-picked Pentagon press corps with far-right conspiracy websites. “It’s all about projecting an image of strength,” said a former Pentagon official, who, like others interviewed, was granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic. “The new acquisition reform policy is a huge and important thing he’s doing,” the person said, in reference to a new initiative to transform U.S. weapons sales. “But he’s still focused on talking about DEI and grooming standards instead of that policy change.” And that appears to have gone over well in an administration that appreciates confidence, power and loyalty. “Hegseth still seems in tight with (read: loyal) to POTUS,” said another defense official. “And this ridiculousness with Sen. Kelly and the IG investigation could make Hegseth more popular with the president in the short term. Until it backfires.” The Pentagon did not respond to a request for comment. The White House insisted Hegseth was involved in broader discussions about the future of Ukraine. “Secretary Hegseth is deeply involved in all national security matters, including the Russia-Ukraine War, and any suggestion to the contrary is false,” said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt. “In addition to running the Pentagon, Secretary Hegseth manages the weapons sales process to NATO, provides critical battlefield updates to the president, participates in the president’s intelligence briefings, and he is also deeply involved in discussions about Venezuela, China, and all of the challenges around the globe.” His tenure is still tenuous. Hegseth continues to face fallout from Signalgate, one of the most embarrassing incidents of Trump’s second term. The Defense Department’s inspector general is expected to soon conclude an investigation into whether the Pentagon chief released classified information about U.S. military strikes in Yemen this year in a Signal chat that accidentally included a journalist. The release of the report, if it further implicates Hegseth, could present problems. And the Pentagon leader may face subpoenas and uncomfortable hearings if the Democrats win back the House in the midterm elections. Hegseth appears to be playing at least some role in the administration’s controversial efforts to root out drug cartels in Latin America and weaken the authority of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. He traveled to the Dominican Republic on Wednesday as the Pentagon continues with an unprecedented military buildup in the Caribbean. “They’re very situational and they plug and play based on what makes sense at the moment,” said Alex Gray, a National Security Council chief of staff in the first Trump administration. “Some of the things that [Hegseth] is front and center on are things that require the most adept communication expertise and the best messaging capacity.” But Driscoll continued to make his own headlines this week, pushing Ukraine and European allies to accept Trump’s peace proposal and meeting with a Russian delegation as the main U.S. negotiator. Trump indicated on Tuesday that special envoy Steve Witkoff would head to Moscow while Driscoll met with the Ukrainians. The White House tasked Driscoll, who was already set to visit Ukraine to talk about drones, to “go and then open the door for peace,” said a U.S. official familiar with the matter. The plug-and-play dynamic may have roots much earlier in the administration. Another person familiar with the situation said that behind the scenes, Hegseth can come off as stilted and uncomfortable in closed-door diplomatic meetings, and has had to rely on scripts in certain situations. “When you’re in a fluid diplomatic discussion, you can’t just stick to a script,” the person said. And yet it’s Hegseth who has gotten attention from some of Trump’s most ardent supporters, including Loomer, a MAGA influencer. She occasionally meets with Hegseth and has lambasted Driscoll online for not being sufficiently loyal to the president. “I’m not telling Pete Hegseth how to do his job,” Loomer told POLITICO this summer. “He’s a good leader in the sense that he’s not just ignoring [issues I raise] and saying, ‘Oh, well, it doesn’t matter.’” White House allies made the case that Hegseth also has a key role both in Trump-era housecleaning of military brass and the Pentagon’s increasing role in border security and domestic deployments. “The amount of internal cleanup that has to be done is extraordinary,” said Gray. “[Hegseth] has had to be incredibly focused on messaging and communicating the president’s agenda for reforming the department.”

LOS ANGELES — The 2028 Olympic games is adding Team Trump to its roster. LA28, the organizing committee for the upcoming Summer Games and Paralympics in Los Angeles, posted new members of the board of directors to its website Thursday. The common thread among nearly all of the new additions is ties to President Donald Trump. The slate includes well-known political figures like Reince Priebus, the onetime Republican National Committee chair who served as Trump’s first chief of staff in his first term, and Kevin McCarthy, the former House Speaker and Trump ally who is also close with Los Angeles’ Democratic mayor, Karen Bass. Others with Trump connections are Wisconsin Trump mega-donor Diane Hendricks, Patrick Dumont, owner of the Dallas Mavericks and son-in-law of major Trump benefactor Miriam Adelson, and investment banker Ken Moelis, who was a banker for Trump in the 1990s. The influx of new additions means that access to Trump’s White House is now just one phone call away for the commission, an asset at a time when Trump has no hesitation threatening the Democratic-led cities hosting major events. Los Angeles has been a particular target of the president’s ire, including his extraordinary mobilization of the Marines this summer in response to protests against his immigration crackdown. Prior to Thursday’s new members, the board was dominated by former Olympians, Hollywood power players and sports and corporate executives, with little overt partisan branding. Elaine Chao, the former Transportation secretary during Trump’s first term who broke with the president after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, joined the board in January. With the Olympics, America’s 250th anniversary and the World Cup all taking place during Trump’s second term, international sports bodies appear to be moving in sync in their swing toward Trump. FIFA president Gianni Infantino, who has scored more Oval Office visits with Trump this year than any world leader, came to one of his meetings bearing a 24-carat gold trophy that Infantino allowed Trump to keep. FIFA went back to Tiffany & Co. to have a replica made for the team that actually won. Beyond sitting through awkward moments in the Oval Office as Trump threatens tournament co-host Mexico over cartels while taking questions from the press, Infantino has gone out of his way to create a new award, the FIFA Peace Prize, that is widely expected to be given to Trump at the World Cup draw at the Kennedy Center in early December. Casey Wasserman, the chairman of the 2028 LA Olympics organizing committee, has also been solicitous of Trump. He gifted the president medals from the 1984 games in Los Angeles during an August signing ceremony establishing a federal task force for the mega-event. Trump is chair of the task force, which is meant to ensure the games are “safe, seamless and historically successful.” Also joining the LA28 board is Los Angeles business consultant Denita Willoughby and philanthropist Maria Hummer-Tuttle, while Muffy Davis, a seven-time Paralympic medalist, is leaving the board. “We are thrilled to welcome this accomplished group to the LA28 Board who will help create an unforgettable Games for athletes and fans alike,” Wasserman said in a statement.

The United States on Friday sanctioned Colombian President Gustavo Petro, the latest escalation of tensions between Washington and Bogotá over drug trafficking and other issues of bilateral importance. In a press release, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the left-wing leader “has allowed drug cartels to flourish and refused to stop this activity.” The sanctions target Petro and his associates — chiefly his wife, son and several leading Colombian officials. Bessent added that the Trump administration’s actions are intended to “protect our nation and make clear that we will not tolerate the trafficking of drugs into our nation.” Reacting to the sanctions on social media, Petro said “fighting against drug trafficking for decades with efficiency has brought these measures against me by the government of the country which we help to stop its consumption of cocaine. All a paradox, but no steps back and never on our knees.” It’s highly unusual for the U.S. to sanction the sitting leader of a country, let alone a longtime ally like Colombia. But the imposition of sanctions reflects the continued tensions between Petro and the administration, as the Colombian leader has criticized the U.S. military buildup in the Western Hemisphere in the name of combating drug cartels. Petro also previously criticized the U.S. for supporting what he alleged was an Israeli genocide in Gaza, and called on U.S. officials to face charges for a recent spate of strikes against alleged drug trafficking vessels that he claims killed innocent Colombian fishermen. The administration has made no secret of its frustrations with Colombia’s leader. Earlier this week, Trump cut off U.S. aid to Colombia after Petro attacked the administration’s drug boat strikes. And in September, the U.S. revoked Petro’s visa, citing comments he made at a pro-Palestine protest on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly where he called on U.S. service members to resist Israeli actions in Gaza. Colombia was also recently restored to a U.S. list of countries seen as major hubs of narcotics trafficking. The country’s coca fields have expanded continuously since Petro took power, even as Colombia has pushed back on claims that it has turned a blind eye to a resurgent cocaine industry within its borders. Colombian officials have pointed to the continued interdiction of cocaine. Petro, who as a young man joined a Marxist guerrilla group that fought against the Colombian state during the South American country’s ongoing decades-long armed conflict, has advocated for reaching “total peace” with militant groups that continue to fight against the Colombian state. He’s also downplayed the need for eradicating coca fields and blamed Western elites for driving demand for cocaine, severing cooperation with longtime allies, including the United States. Petro’s son, Nicolás Petro, has been accused of funneling drug cartel funds into his father’s electoral campaign. But there is no evidence that the Colombian president himself is involved with or directly supportive of the cartels the U.S. links him to. The decision was applauded by some of Petro’s Republican critics in Congress, many of whom represent large Colombian American communities and have bashed the leader. “GREAT MOVE, Petro is a problem for Colombia and our hemisphere!” posted Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Western Hemisphere Subcommittee. Salazar also called Petro a “socialist dictator” in her post on X.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday floated targeting Venezuelan drug cartels with land strikes, an escalation of his administration’s repeated strikes on boats out of the country as he tries to staunch the flow of drugs into the U.S. Speaking to reporters, Trump said his administration has “almost totally stopped” drug trafficking by sea and “now we’ll stop it by land.” “I don’t want to tell you exactly, but we are certainly looking at land now because we have the sea very well under control,” Trump said. Over the last month, the U.S. has carried out at least five strikes on Venezuelan boats the White House characterized as “narcoterrorists” responsible for smuggling drugs into the country. The latest strike on Tuesday killed six suspected drug traffickers in international waters, Trump said. The strikes have been met with backlash, with lawmakers on both sides of the aisle arguing the actions constitute “illegal killings.” A group of former Republican officials have said they believe the strikes may not be legal. Trump on Wednesday defended his administration’s decisions, stating that the previous use of the U.S. Coast Guard investigating boats before action was taken has been “totally ineffective.” “They have faster boats, some of these boats, I mean, they are world-class speedboats,” Trump said. “But they’re not faster than missiles.” Trump argued that each strike his administration launches saves thousands of American lives. “Every time you see a boat and you feel badly and you say ‘wow that’s rough,’ it is rough but if you lose three people and save 25,000 people — these are people that are killing our population,” Trump said. “The boats get hit and you see that fentanyl all over the ocean, it’s like floating in bags, it’s all over the place. We’re saving a tremendous amount of lives.”

The European Commission has opened a door marked danger. In July it issued a guidance letter blessing the creation of what is known as an Automotive Licensing Negotiation Group (Auto LNG). In doing so, it gave the green light to rival carmakers to form a cartel-like entity to negotiate licenses for patents that underpin standardized technologies (standards essential patents, or SEPs).   > SEPs are vital in many industries because they enable devices and services to interoperate seamlessly across different manufacturers, platforms and geographies. They cover technologies such as Wi-Fi, 5G and video coding, and are integral to the Internet of Things.   > SEPs are vital in many industries because they enable devices and services to > interoperate seamlessly across different manufacturers, platforms and > geographies. For decades, EU competition law treated the collective bargaining among competitors that LNGs of any kind represent as off-limits. The timing of the change was not incidental.   In September the Commission also released draft revisions of its Technology Transfer Block Exemption Regulation and Technology Transfer Guidelines (TTG). Together, these texts shape how Europe manages its innovation economy, including its SEP licensing market.  A success story at stake  On the positive side, the drafts reaffirm the importance of transparent patent pools. Such pools bring together complementary SEPs owned by multiple parties and make them available through a single license. Pools cut transaction costs, create efficiencies and provide clarity to technology implementers.    SEP owners who contribute technology to a standard promise to license their patents on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms. Pools put that commitment into practice by offering a single license that the market can accept or reject.   The draft TTG strengthens requirements for transparency and governance in pools by emphasizing the importance of essentiality checks, published terms, open participation and safeguards against collusion. These measures codify practices many pools already follow. In doing so, the Commission is rightly cementing transparent pools’ role as trusted intermediaries in SEP licensing.  LNGs and FRAND cannot co-exist  Properly structured pools only succeed if implementers view their terms as balanced; they cannot ‘enforce’ acceptance into existence. When the market pushes back, pools adjust. That responsiveness makes them both pro-competitive and self-correcting.   LNGs invert that logic. As coalitions of buyers, their explicit objective is to aggregate purchasing power to secure discounts from the prevailing FRAND rate — all while their members continue to use the technology. However, the non-discrimination limb of FRAND makes across the board ‘group discounts’ very hard to square with commitments owed to all implementers, including those that have already taken licenses, directly or through a pool. This distorts competition by enabling buyers to exert undue pressure on licensors.  The draft TTG seeks to allay concerns by requiring LNG participation to be open and internally non-discriminatory, yet it does not grapple with the external effect on the SEP holder’s non-discrimination duty. That omission risks forcing a de facto “LNG rate” onto the whole market.   Asymmetry and holdout risk  The asymmetry here is striking. If price talks fail for tangible inputs, suppliers can simply stop shipments. Not so with SEPs: once standardized, the technology is embedded and keeps being used unless long, costly litigation is pursued. This reality gives coordinated buyers leverage to delay or avoid paying – a textbook recipe for holdout and cartel-like behavior.  Some argue that if licensors can license jointly through pools, licensees should be able to do so in LNGs. This is false logic. Pools aggregate non-competing assets to make complementary patents accessible. LNGs aggregate competing buyers to dictate price, a monopsony dynamic that competition law has long treated with suspicion. Pools, by contrast, have no such power. They live or die by market acceptance. Their incentive is to align with existing demand.  Process shortcuts, shaky justifications  Equally troubling is how the Commission chose to act. The July letter was issued under an ‘informal guidance’ procedure, an opaque tool usually used to clarify cutting-edge cases. SEP holders and smaller innovators were not consulted, despite being directly affected.  The substantive justification is no better. Both the Commission and Germany’s Bundeskartellamt, which had previously authorized the ALNG in June 2024, leaned on a market-share threshold, finding automakers represent less than 15 percent of the ‘general mobile communications’ market.   However, connected cars represent a completely separate vertical, with distinct technical features like vehicle-to-vehicle communication, and the market threshold should apply to it specifically. Furthermore, in licensing markets, a coordinated 15 percent holdout can freeze dealmaking across the board. That risk is ignored.  > Connected cars represent a completely separate vertical, with distinct > technical features. Meanwhile, the invocation of decarbonization as a reason to tolerate cartel-like structures conflates policy domains. Climate objectives, however worthy, cannot excuse weakening competition law guardrails.  Keep the back door closed  Pools already deliver the benefits LNGs claim — lower transaction costs, broader access, transparent terms, market efficiencies — without cartel risks. Most importantly, the FRAND framework, tested in courts and practice, continues to support rapid technology rollouts across the EU and is fully compatible with pools. It is utterly incompatible with LNGs. To adhere to FRAND principles that are the cornerstone of SEP licensing worldwide, LNGs cannot exist.  > Pools already deliver the benefits LNGs claim — lower transaction costs, > broader access, transparent terms, market efficiencies — without cartel risks. If the Commission wants to modernize SEP policy, it should do so openly and only when market failures are identified. This involves consultation to establish clear criteria and evidence of consumer benefit. By contrast, its current approach threatens to disrupt efficient markets, squeeze royalties that fund research and development, and slow Europe’s pace of innovation.  In reinforcing transparent pools, the Commission got one big thing right with its draft TTG. It should not squander that by blessing LNGs.  Roberto Dini has more than 40 years’ experience in patent licensing and is recognized as one of the global market’s most respected experts.    For a detailed analysis of the legal, economic and procedural defects in the Auto LNG approach — and a fuller comparison between pools and LNGs — see: Auto Licensing Negotiation Groups are a Bad, Anticompetitive Idea.