Anthony Zurcher

Will do.

All right.

And talk to everyone else soon.

Bye, y'all.

And it's Anthony in the BBC Bureau in Washington, DC.

Absolutely.

I've been keeping my eye on this ever since the United States was announced as one of the co-hosts of the World Cup.

And then when Donald Trump was reelected in 2024, it occurred to me very early on that he's going to be president not only during the Olympics in 2028.

america's 250th birthday celebrations this july but also the world cup he loves being center stage he loves being the person particularly with sporting events he's been had a connection to sports for most of his adult life owning a sports football american football franchise being involved in boxing

So you knew he was going to inject himself right into the middle of this.

And with Donald Trump comes all of the divisiveness, all of the politics, all of the chaos that he has brought to politics ever since he first ran for president in 2015.

Well, I think part of it was because the scope of this World Cup was much bigger with, as John mentioned, more teams that this was going to be one of the or the biggest World Cup in the tournament's history.

They needed to be able to produce it over a much wider piece of real estate.

We had had joint World Cups before.

Obviously, Japan and South Korea hosted a World Cup.

But this one with the United States, with Mexico, with North America, they all

pitch the idea together.

They thought this would be a unifying type of proposal.

These three countries that were closely connected geographically, but also by their trade relationships, that they would be able to put on the kind of show that would befit this much larger World Cup undertaking.

So it was...