President Trump (middle) and First Lady Melania Trump (far left) with FIFA President Gianni Infantino on July 13 at the final match of the FIFA Club World Cup at MetLife Stadium.

Will President Donald Trump finally win a global peace prize?

International soccer's governing body will announce the recipient of its first ever FIFA Peace Prize at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, on Dec. 5. The award will be given during the widely-televised reveal of the groupings of nations for the first phase of competition in the 2026 World Cup soccer championship that is to be played in more than a dozen U.S., Mexican and Canadian cities next summer.

FIFA stands for Fédération Internationale de Football Association and is based in Zurich, Switzerland. It is the governing body over all national and confederations soccer associations, including the United States Soccer Federation that oversees the American men's and women's national teams.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino announced the new peace prize on Nov. 5 at the America Business Forum in Miami. Infantino said the inspiration for the award was the motto that the planet's most popular sport "unites the world."

"But when we see what is happening in our world today, which is a very divided world, I think, and we think in FIFA that we need to find more occasions to bring people together," Infantino said. "Because only if people come together and they speak to each other, they can understand each other."

Infantino added that while soccer brings people and communities together it is also important the sport acknowledges the efforts of leaders to promote peace.

"We have to support anyone who is doing something special for peace," he said. "So we thought we have to bring to life the FIFA Peace Prize (to recognize) somebody who has done so much, or is doing so much for peace, because we need that. (Soccer) helps a little bit, but then we need leaders who push it into the goal, right, and to score the goal."

FIFA president an unabashed admirer of Trump

Trump has claimed he has ended roughly 10 conflicts around the world since taking office in January. Those include a peace treaty scheduled to be signed by Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo on Dec. 4 in Washington at the recently renamed Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace.

Trump brokered an end to hostilities in the Israel-Gaza, but the violence still continues in that region. Strikes by Israeli military aircraft in Lebanon reportedly killed six Palestinians this week. Trump and his administration continue seeking an accord to end the war in Ukraine that has raged for almost four years since the Russian invasion of the eastern European country.

Infantino's close relationship with Trump has triggered speculation the president, who publicly coveted and campaigned for the Nobel Peace Prize this year, would be the winner.

In fact, during the talk at the Miami conference, Infantino glowed when talking about Trump, with whom he feels "very lucky" to have such "a great relationship." He said the U.S. president, during his first term in the White House, was "very, very helpful" in helping to secure the United States as a host for next year's tournament.

"He does things. He does what, what he says, he says, what he thinks," Infantino said. "He says, actually, what many people think as well, but maybe don't dare to say, and that's why he's so successful, right?"

The FIFA chief then went on to say he is "surprised" by criticism of Trump.

"He was elected based on a program, based on what he said, and he's just implementing what he said he would do," Infantino said. "So I think we should all support what he's doing, because I think he's doing pretty good, absolutely right. And for FIFA, even more."

But those remarks also drew a rebuke from within Infantino's FIFA community for comments said to have breached requirements that FIFA officials remain neutral and not intrude in or endorse member nation's political platforms or leaders.

Miguel Maduro, a former chairman of FIFA's governance committee, said Infantino crossed a line he should not. Maduro said Infantino was within his rights to recognize the legitimacy of a foreign leader but not state support of or call for backing a country's leader or policies.

FIFA gets challenged about its peace prize by advocacy groups

FIFA is also facing calls for it to "match its lofty rhetoric on rights with concrete action" in light of the peace award. The demand came from a coalition of human, civil and labor rights organizations including Human Rights Watch, AFL-CIO, Amnesty International and NAACP.

“FIFA’s so-called peace prize is being awarded against a backdrop of violent detentions of immigrants, national guard deployments in US cities, and the obsequious cancellation of FIFA’s own anti-racism and anti-discrimination campaigns,” said Minky Worden, who oversees sport for Human Rights Watch, in a statement. “There is still time to honor FIFA’s promises for a World Cup not tainted by human rights abuses, but the clock is ticking.”

In addition, the Trump administration is embroiled in glaring scrutiny over what critics say could be a war crime: The deliberate killing of survivors in a second strike on a vessel off the Venezuelan coast. The Sept. 2 attack is part of a series of nearly two dozen deadly strikes on boats the administration has accused, without publicly presenting evidence, of smuggling illegal narcotics.

Moreover, the president excoriated "most" of the foreign-born U.S. population in a scathing social media post late on Thanksgiving night.

"The official United States Foreign population stands at 53 million people (Census), most of which are on welfare, from failed nations, or from prisons, mental institutions, gangs, or drug cartels," Trump wrote. "They and their children are supported through massive payments from Patriotic American Citizens who, because of their beautiful hearts, do not want to openly complain or cause trouble in any way, shape, or form."

Trump has related to voters through shared interest in sports

Trump has long been associated with sports, especially golf. By Golfweek's count, Trump's business empire owns 11 clubs in the United States and another four overseas. During a call with military servicemen and women on Thanksgiving, the president said he has "legitimately" won 38 club championships.

But the president has attended a series of other sporting events, including the Super Bowl, Daytona 500 auto race and UFC mixed martial arts bouts.

Political analysts say his appearance at those events have broaden his political appeal.

"He's at the Super Bowl. He's at NASCAR, and relating to people who are at UFC fights," said Junelle Cavero Harnal, head of My Code Political, a marketing and data firm. "And I do think that that's related to his strategy."

Cavero Harnal said Trump's connection with voters at sporting and cultural events helped him win over larger shares of Latino, Black and younger voters in 2024. Since then, My Code's tracker has found that the administration's immigration policies and inability to address affordability issues has meant many of those voters are swinging away from him.

But the lesson that connecting with voters through non-political events is still worth copying.

"If every elected official in America, every legislative, every congressional member, attended their local sporting event that was highly popular, I'm 100% confident the interest in political or public service would be greater," she said. "Not because they were at a food shelter handing out turkeys. Voters understand more what a football game's like versus you're going to a local food shelter."

Antonio Fins is a politics and business editor at The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach him at afins@pbpost.com.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: FIFA will award its own peace prize. Will Trump win it?

Reporting by Antonio Fins, Palm Beach Post / Palm Beach Post

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