How to watch all 3 World Cup 2026 opening ceremonies: Shakira, Katy Perry, more
All three host nations will have their own opening ceremonies.

We continue our World Cup coverage in Mexico City, where local protesters are using the global event to bring attention to their causes. A sit-in by a teachers’ union is targeting World Cup festivities. And “the mothers of disappeared people have been protesting, trying to reach the stadium in the far south of the city,” says José Luis Granados Ceja, who covers Latin America for Drop Site News. Meanwhile, due to high ticket prices, “the people who love this sport are not going to be able to attend the games. They have been extraordinarily inaccessible to the population,” adds Granados Cejas.
All three host nations will have their own opening ceremonies.
Unlike most other countries, the US are playing the 2026 World Cup not just for themselves, but for the future of their voice in the sportWorld Cup newsletter | Daily podcast | Download the appMauricio Pochettino paused. The microphone signal flickered. He tried, for a second time, to say a few things to the 5,500 fans who had gathered in the sun Monday at Championship Soccer Stadium in Irvine, California – the United States’ World Cup home base – for an open training session. Nothing. Then something. More choppy audio. By the time things came back online, he had developed a quip.“We are in the greatest country in the world,” he said in his Rioplatense-accented English. “But the technology does not work.” Continue reading...
Who's ready for a summer of nonstop World Cup action?!
It's been a long four years, but the FIFA World Cup officially kicks off today.
As soccer fans from across the world travel to the United States this month to cheer on their countries’ teams at the 2026 FIFA World Cup, a poll released Wednesday by Data for Progress suggests Americans don’t believe many visitors have warm feelings toward the host country after a year-and-a-half of President Donald Trump’s leadership.Overall the poll found that 62% of American voters think the country’s reputation has deteriorated under Trump, with just 32% saying it’s gotten better.Republicans were the only political faction to believe Trump has improved global views of the US, while Independents and Democrats overwhelmingly said the president has made them worse.The poll also found 52% of US voters believed Trump’s mass deportation policies have hurt the country’s image in the world, with just 34% saying the deportations have helped.Trump’s immigration policies collided with the World Cup earlier this week when Somali referee Omar Artan, who was selected by the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) to work at the celebrated event, was barred from entering the US despite having a valid visa.A Trump administration official claimed Artan had an “association with suspected members of terror organizations,” but provided no evidence for the allegation. US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) called his treatment by the US “a disgrace.”Polling data published last year by Pew suggests that Democrats and Independents are more accurately measuring global public sentiment of the US under Trump’s leadership than Republicans.Specifically, Pew found that net positive perceptions of the US dropped by 10 percentage points or more among residents in a dozen countries between 2024 and 2025, including in key allies such as Canada, Mexico, Germany, and France.What’s more, Pew found only five countries where the United States’ reputation has improved since Trump’s election: South Africa, India, Israel, Nigeria, and Turkey.Trump during his second term has taken a number of actions that have sparked anger from foreign governments, including making repeated threats to seize Greenland as a US territory, invading Venezuela and abducting its president, imposing an oil blockade on and threatening to take over Cuba, launching a global trade war, and waging an illegal war of choice on Iran.
The Trump admin suspends federal funding for Los Angeles's primary homelessness support agency, accusing it of fraud and 'wanton mismanagement' of taxpayer dollars.
Four years of waiting are over; the 2026 World Cup is about to commence.
Ted Lasso will deliver a message of hope before the USA’s first game, in an America that is not a fit or desirable host right nowShortly before 6pm local time on Friday night at the Los Angeles Stadium, the actor who plays Ted Lasso – the fictional manager of a fake team in a falsely heartwarming version of football – will tell hundreds of millions of TV viewers tuning in to watch the start of the American leg of the Fifa World Cup that football unites the world.In an interesting twist, the actor Jason Sudeikis will do this at a time when the World Cup host is simultaneously bombing the second-ranked country in Group G, having recently murdered its head of state. The message of unity is one likely to be heard by the US president, Donald Trump, who has initiated six military conflicts in his second term, and whose brutally divisive immigration policies have now led to the barring of Omar Artan, the reigning African referee of the year. Continue reading...