New Jersey’s Big Fight with FIFA

[00:00:00]Before we start, one thing. Do not walk to MetLife Stadium. I don't care what point you want to make about Americans' car-centric brain worms or whether it's physically possible. Just as you should not put a tomato in a fruit salad or do a 10-minute song at karaoke or go base jumping, you should not walk to MetLife Stadium. Got it? I have to say this because in April [music] 2026, half my feed was people debating whether attendees at the eight matches hosted at New Jersey's MetLife Stadium should walk 10 miles or, put Europeanly, 16 kilometers there from Manhattan. This debate followed the announcement that a round trip NYC to MetLife train for the World Cup would cost $150.

[00:00:39]Mind you, the rest of the time it costs $12.90. [music] On its face, this is a cruel and unusual fare hike designed by New Jersey Transit to gouge soccer fans for every last [music] dime they didn't already drop on match tickets. But what if, and bear with me here, there was nuance? [music] These eye-popping train and bus fares, buses $80 at the time of writing, to the World Cup are just the flashiest symptom of a feud between FIFA [music] and the great state of New Jersey, two of the world's most stubborn, self-respecting institutions. But how did they become bitter rivals while co-hosting the biggest event in the world? The answer is, of course, [music] money and also term limits and also the glittering and imposing allure of New York City. The 2026 World Cup, if you hadn't heard, is being co-hosted by 16 cities across North America with the vast majority of matches, 78 of the tournament's 104, >> [music] >> taking place in the United States.

[00:01:32]Somewhat weirdly, there is not one single North American World Cup host committee running all the sites the way there was in Qatar or Russia for the previous two World Cups or even the way there was when the US hosted the tournament in 1994. Instead, each city has its own host [music] committee and therefore its own agreement and relationship with FIFA. FIFA came to Jersey thanks to these two, former Governor Phil Murphy and former First Lady Tammy Murphy. When North America was making its bid to host the 2026 [music] World Cup back in 2018, then Governor Murphy hit FIFA with the old razzle-dazzle, selling New Jersey and its proximity [music] to New York City as the perfect backdrop. New York-New Jersey was announced as a host [music] in June of 2022, around the start of his second term, with Tammy as the chair of the host committee. They even got the championship match. Murphy's governorship ended on January 20th, 2026, and [music] he was term-limited out of running again, which meant that actually hosting the World Cup would fall to his successor, Mikie Sherrill, who had run her campaign on affordability and doesn't seem thrilled to be holding the bag for eight insanely expensive World Cup matches. Per their agreements, host cities pay for security for players, VIPs, fans, and the general public, [music] police escorts, fire services, medical services, free or heavily subsidized transportation, converting their football fields into football fields, and even throwing a huge free-to-attend fan festival. These are the literal terms of hosting the World Cup. FIFA puts them in the host agreement with exacting standards [music] on their execution. So exacting that they specify how deep the roots on the grass on the field go. According to northjersey.com, New Jersey has spent [music] $307 million hosting this World Cup. But these costs come out in the wash, right? It's the World Cup. It prints money, right? Well, yes, but not for the host. FIFA monopolizes most tournament revenue.

[00:03:20]Hosts don't get a cut of ticket sales, advertising within the stadiums, broadcast rights to the matches, official merch, or parking. FIFA even makes money off the concessions sold in the stadium. But perhaps the biggest revenue source FIFA blocks access to is global sponsorships. Each of their big World Cup partnerships is worth 50 to 100 million dollars, zero of which go to the hosts. Instead, hosts are allowed up to 10 local sponsors in deals each worth about 3 to 5 million dollars, meaning that even if you maxed out your local sponsors, which no host city has been able to, you're making less than what FIFA makes off of one global deal. Also, your sponsors can't be categorical competitors with any global sponsors.

[00:04:01]Meaning, for example, that Boston can't get sponsor dollars from their neighbors at New Balance because FIFA works with Well, none of these companies paid me tens of millions of dollars, so let's censor. FIFA works with New York and New Jersey can't work with Westchester's own Pepsi because FIFA works with or Rochester's own MasterCard because FIFA works with or Queens' own JetBlue because FIFA works with What's left? Well, in New York and New Jersey's case, these seven companies.

[00:04:26]Two real estate firms, a farmer company, a healthcare provider network, a law firm, an energy company, and hey, a sports magazine. Relevant? Host cities get some money from beyond their own pockets. US government and some state event funds have put up hundreds of millions to help various host cities.

[00:04:41]But in general, hosts pay out of pocket while FIFA makes the money to the tune of 13 billion dollars this time around.

[00:04:48]And the costs FIFA punts to hosts [music] are astronomical.

[00:04:52]For example, since 2006, they've told hosts to hold events where up to 15,000 ticketless fans could watch matches on TV instead of gathering outside the stadium. It's a lovely idea, but it's an expensive one to pull off, costing something like a million dollars per day across the 39 days of this year's World Cup, adding up to a quarter of some host cities' costs. And of course, FIFA has 159 pages of demands for how fan fest should work and puts up little money to execute. Multiple US host cities pushed back on this, and Mikie Sherrill simply canceled jerseys completely when she got into office, citing concerns around logistics, security, and costs. The situation around the trains is pretty similar, except canceling them isn't an option because FIFA puts so much security and hospitality in the MetLife parking lot that there will be no parking there on match days at all.

[00:05:38]Basically, the 2026 host city agreements all said that hosts had to provide free transportation to matches for spectators. In 2023, after COVID had a whopped most transit systems, FIFA said, "Fine, transportation doesn't have to be free, but you have to provide it at cost." Lucky Sheryl stance is that these insanely high fares to MetLife are providing the trip at cost because disrupting regular New Jersey transit service, paying overtime, cheering more people because there's no parking, fixing train cars, and using the not all that frequently used Meadowlands rail line between Secaucus and MetLife, Jersey estimates they'll be $48 million in the hole on rail costs. Even after receiving funding from the host committee and the Biden and Trump administrations. [music] So, that cost, according to Sheryl, is going to either fall to Jersey's commuters and taxpayers, the World Cup spectators themselves, or FIFA. Sheryl wants to put as much as she can on option two. Well, FIFA can cut whatever check they'd like to New Jersey Transit if they'd like the split to look different. And while the price hike's unpopular, that unpopularity is largely among out-of-town visitors planning to stay in New York anyway, not Jersey taxpayers, not Sheryl's voters. And Jersey is in a unique spot. Most World Cup hosts sign up because despite the cost, they'll raise their profile and rake in mega dollars from droves of spectators who will yes, go to matches, but also eat at their restaurants, stay in their hotels, and buy their shirts that say, "I lost my heart in New Jersey and my New Jersey in New York, World Cup 2026" or whatever. But, Jersey will see little of that money because the vast majority of World Cup attendees will stay and pay across the river in New York. So, Jersey gets to pay hundreds of millions to host only for the benefit to go to New York and the revenue to go to FIFA. And to salt the wound, FIFA renamed MetLife Stadium New York New Jersey Stadium for the duration of the event, which some Jerseyans point out as an interesting name for a stadium that is not in New York. [music] So, yes, $100 train fares are nasty, but if you were in New Jersey, would you do anything different? Or would you just devote yourself to thorning FIFA's side and reminding the FIFAs of the world that if they think they're all that because they've pushed around Russia, Qatar, or Los Angeles, >> [music] >> they haven't met the final boss.

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