UNITED STATES PERSPECTIVE

Washington experiences the kickoff as a political Rorschach test where everyone reads what they want. On the pitch, the national team delivered its best-ever World Cup performance, crushing Paraguay 4-1 at SoFi Stadium thanks to a Folarin Balogun brace. But the American narrative split in two. The conservative press celebrates the patriotic party and jeers at 'left-wing' columnists: Fox News mocks a USA Today columnist who argues 'the United States has already lost' the tournament because of Trump's politics, calling the take 'absurd.' Conversely, the same press eagerly covers the clashes in Mexico City, where 'anti-government protesters clashed with riot police' while Shakira sang inside the Azteca, a man suffering a heart attack in the crush. The major political fact, meanwhile, commands consensus even in its ambiguity: Donald Trump became the first US president to skip his team's opening match at a World Cup, with task-force CEO Andrew Giuliani confirming his absence while Marco Rubio, present in Los Angeles, represented him. The official explanation — the Iran agenda — does not extinguish the suspicion that Trump prefers to control the narrative from Truth Social, as he did by posting the video of the Venezuelan strike at the exact moment of kickoff. The American debate over denied visas and the migration policy 'splashing' onto the tournament remains carefully muted by pro-administration media.