With two months until the largest and most logistically complex sporting event ever held on American soil, the Department of Homeland Security remains mired in a record-long funding shutdown as the U.S. confronts a military conflict with an adversary that has historically supported global terrorism.
The U.S. and its fellow host countries have prepared for years to secure the FIFA World Cup 2026. Those efforts, however, are dependent on lockstep cooperation among federal, state and local authorities, particularly amid an elevated threat environment.
The question is whether political polarization could undermine that coordination at a critical moment.
“Right now, we’re in a place where the politics is leading the way rather than the 30,000-foot view, which is we should all be pushing in the same direction to make sure this is a safe and successful World Cup,” said Andrew Giuliani, executive director of the White House’s World Cup task force.
The U.S. is no stranger to securing large sporting events, but the scale of the 2026 World Cup is unprecedented. The first 48-team edition of the competition will feature 104 matches in 16 host cities across the U.S., Canada and Mexico over 40 days, including 78 matches in 11 U.S. markets.
G.B. Jones, chief safety and security officer for FIFA, said during a panel at the Atlantic Council that more than 600 sites — including hotels, airports, transportation systems, stadiums, training facilities and fan fests — will fall within the organization’s security footprint. That, of course, doesn’t include the thousands of other places fans will gather.
DHS has categorized the tournament as a Level 1 event on its Special Event Assessment Rating scale, a classification reserved for “significant events with national and/or international importance that require extensive federal interagency support.” Juliette Kayyem, a Harvard professor who served at DHS under the Obama administration, said that designation is unprecedented for an event of this length and geographic scale.
While FIFA plays a role in ensuring the safety and security of the World Cup, much of the responsibility will fall to a combination of local, state and federal authorities.
Local and state law enforcement agencies are responsible for on-the-ground operations, including crowd control and venue security, while federal agencies provide intelligence, coordination and specialized capabilities, such as cybersecurity, counter-drone measures and border security.
Giuliani said DHS serves as the “umbilical cord” connecting federal agencies to host cities, ensuring information flows across markets as teams and fans move throughout the tournament.
Funding for the department remains tied up in Congress, however, amid an impasse over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement efforts.
Giuliani said the partial shutdown has already led to critical preparation being put on hold and could create staffing shortages, particularly at agencies such as the Coast Guard, which plans to deploy more than 1,000 personnel across eight World Cup sites and is responsible for counter-drone security at several of them.
“There are plans that are getting pushed rightward that we should be executing now, different training exercises that the Department of Homeland Security wants and needs to be a part of,” Giuliani said. “At this point right now, we should be in full operational mode.”
In addition to being at the center of the DHS funding issue, political tension over immigration enforcement also could threaten cooperation between federal and local authorities in the wake of the killings of two protestors by federal agents in Minneapolis earlier this year.
“The shooting of two Americans for immigration enforcement has left [DHS] with a very hostile relationship with locals and states,” Kayyem said. “That’s not a great place to be.”
Any deployment of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents around the World Cup could become a political flashpoint, potentially driving a wedge between the federal government and local authorities. Democrats in Congress have already filed a series of bills aimed at limiting ICE’s presence around the tournament.
Giuliani declined to provide specifics on the administration’s plans to conduct immigration enforcement activity or deploy ICE agents for security, saying he would have more clarity following an upcoming meeting with newly appointed Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin.
These concerns about domestic coordination come as the U.S. war in Iran continues, a conflict security experts say has elevated the risk of attacks directed or inspired by the Iranian regime. Colin Clarke, executive director of security-focused think tank The Soufan Center, called the current conflict “existential” for the regime.
“If there were ever a tripwire that would operationalize assets overseas, it’s now,” Clarke said.
He added that the high profile and complexity of the trinational World Cup make it particularly vulnerable.
“You’ve got vertical coordination between local, state, federal, and then you’ve got across countries, which is extremely hard to do, and bad guys don’t face these same kinds of challenges,” Clarke said. “So yeah, I’m very concerned for what could happen.”
The system designed to secure the World Cup is robust, but it depends on cooperation across jurisdictions, agencies and political parties. While there is always risk associated with major events, fans should expect those responsible for their safety to be operating at full strength.
Securing an event of this scale is hard enough without political infighting getting in the way.
Alex Silverman can be reached at asilverman@sportsbusinessjournal.com.
