Opinion: The Club World Cup should celebrate immigrants, not criminalize them

As the FIFA Club World Cup prepares to bring global attention to the United States, we should be celebrating the power of soccer to unite people across borders. Instead, a troubling pattern is emerging: increased immigration enforcement and border control measures that threaten to cast suspicion on the very communities that have kept this sport alive in America.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced last week that it will be at the games, “suited and booted to provide security,” while the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents will be there as well, and added this reminder: “all non-American citizens need to carry proof of their legal status."

Yet, we know that this is not about security. It’s about racial profiling – and it has no place in a tournament meant to celebrate global connection.

We represent different sectors – public service and nonprofit advocacy – but we are united in our work for immigrant justice. We’ve both seen how language like “public safety” and “border control” can become cover for policies that disproportionately target Black and brown communities, particularly immigrants from Latin America, Africa and the Caribbean.

These enforcement plans are not new. We’ve seen them before – at airports, workplaces and large public gatherings – where immigration agencies use major events as an excuse to ramp up surveillance, arrests, and deportations. Now, they’re setting their sights on soccer fans.

You would never see this kind of enforcement plan rolled out at the Super Bowl or the NBA Finals – because those events aren’t culturally associated with immigrant communities. That’s the quiet part being said out loud: these policies aren’t about safety.

They’re about who gets treated like they belong and who gets treated like a threat.

The message this sends is clear: if you are an immigrant, if you are Latino, if you look or sound foreign, you might not be welcome – not even at an event built around global participation. 

That’s wrong. It’s also dangerous. 

For millions of immigrants across the U.S., soccer is more than a sport – it is a connection to home, to culture and to community. The Club World Cup should be an opportunity for celebration. Instead, these enforcement tactics create fear and discourage participation. People shouldn’t have to choose between watching a match and risking harassment or detention.

We believe in public safety – but not at the expense of civil rights. Security planning must not rely on racial profiling or immigration status. New York is a sanctuary city, and that means we must protect the dignity of all people – residents and visitors alike.

We call on city, state and federal agencies, as well as FIFA and the tournament’s organizers, to ensure that immigration enforcement does not play a role in the fan experience. That means no raids, no profiling, no collaboration with ICE or CBP to monitor or detain fans. It means investing in multilingual outreach, safe public transportation, and culturally competent crowd management – not criminalization.

At a time of rising nationalism and anti-immigrant rhetoric, we must be intentional about what this tournament represents. The world will be watching. Let’s begin to show them a nation that leads with dignity, not fear.