For half a century, FIFA’s leaders have dished out bribes and raked them in as they’ve cozied up—and handed the World Cup—to despots and murderous regimes all over the globe, from Argentina in 1978 to Russia in 2018. Even the generational scandal that led, in 2015, to multiple arrests on charges of racketeering and wire fraud couldn’t reform FIFA, which simply replaced its old way of doing business (cash slipped into pockets or slid across the table in unmarked envelopes) with a new approach, which one former member of its governance board has described as “legal bribery.”Last year, even by its own debauched standards, FIFA outdid itself when it produced one of recent history’s most innovative sweeteners: a fake peace prize that it invented to curry favor with Donald Trump, who was still furious about missing out on the real one. The FIFA Peace Prize is not exactly the Nobel, to put it mildly. It is an obvious farce, a preposterously stupid award that carried no meaning, let alone prestige. It would be absurd even if it hadn’t been invented to mollify the erratic and belligerent Trump; the fact that it had only made it more ridiculous. But what rendered the FIFA Peace Prize really funny was that Trump seemed genuinely moved when he accepted it.“This is truly one of the great honors of my life,” a visibly touched Trump said shortly after accepting the prize from Gianni Infantino, the slick operator who has led FIFA since 2016. “Beyond awards, Gianni and I were discussing this, we saved millions and millions of lives,” he continued, before rattling off a preposterous list of the wars and conflicts he claims to have ended. Desperate to be recognized as a great statesman, Trump was not just unbothered by the fact that the prize he had just been given was invented solely for the purpose of puffery; he was seemingly the only person in the world for whom it carried any meaning whatsoever.More than three months after it was awarded, people are still making fun of the FIFA Peace Prize. Perhaps the defining joke of Trump’s second term, it has real staying power. When Trump dies, we can expect a flood of sarcastic tweets mourning the passing of a FIFA Peace Prize winner. But Infantino, the prize’s creator, is not concerned with the opinion of the masses—a sentiment that increasingly shapes FIFA’s approach to soccer in general. For over a year, his primary concern has been the opinion of just one man, Donald Trump. If the cost of winning Trump’s favor is self-debasement, humiliation, and a made-up prize—so be it.America’s relationships with both of its World Cup co-hosts, Canada and Mexico, were not great on the occasion of the prize, but they have only deteriorated since; Europe’s soccer confederacy has mulled pulling out of the tournament if Trump were to follow through on his threat to invade Greenland; the State Department stopped processing visas from 75 countries—15 of which have qualified for the World Cup—and federal agents killed two civilians during a monthslong operation in Minnesota. Trump, meanwhile, is more erratic and impulsive than ever.And then there is the war in Iran, which, come June, may very well still be ongoing—and may involve U.S. ground troops. Iran has qualified for the tournament, though its participation is currently in doubt. Soccer officials in the country have threatened to withdraw from the tournament if the U.S-Israeli military campaign continues. Since the U.S.-Israeli campaign began, Iran has bombed three World Cup qualifying nations—Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Qatar—and one that is in the playoff: Iraq. Trump, for his part, has said he “really doesn’t care” if Iran plays or not. (FIFA certainly does care and has threatened Iran with a substantial fine and lengthy ban if they pull out of the tournament.) Meanwhile, there are other signs that the tournament itself will be chaotic and poorly managed. Host cities across the country still haven’t received hundreds of millions of dollars in allocated funding for security, which has led several to scrap planned “fan fests”—public gathering spaces to watch the World Cup. Foxborough, a Boston suburb and host city, is currently threatening to withhold key permits if an $8 million funding gap isn’t covered by FIFA. As for FIFA, it just quietly slashed its budget for the tournament by $100 million.As the tournament draws closer, chaos seems increasingly inevitable. And yet there is no indication Infantino even cares. Trump certainly doesn’t.One could reasonably conclude that Infantino has gained remarkably little in exchange for his dignity. But he is playing a longer game. For the Swiss sports technocrat, his relationship with Trump is the key to a successful World Cup—but he’s hardly thinking of the contest itself. Instead, he’s focused on the fantastic amount of tax-free money that it will generate, income he will then use to further enhance his standing as FIFA president.