What is the difference between the Fifa and the National Football LeagueNFL for short? The world football association has been trying to get involved for some time Donald Trump good to put. Think of the award ceremony at the Club World Cup in the summer of 2025, where Fifa boss Gianni Infantino did not intervene when the president of the USA didn’t leave the stage. Or the group draw ceremony for the upcoming World Cup in the United States, Mexico and You haveat which Infantino presented Trump with the specially created Fifa Peace Prize. They both posed for selfies, laughed and acted like best friends.
FIFA aims to go where football is not number 1 on earth. It wants to grow in the US market, and to increase its chances of doing so, the association has decided to give the US president what Trump values most: he can be courted. The NFL apparently doesn’t need such pandering. In the USA, no one can ignore the highest-grossing sports league in the world: of the 100 most-watched TV programs in 2025 in the USA, 83 were NFL games. 50 million people recently watched the play-off duel between the Denver Broncos and the Buffalo Bills. The 60th Super Bowl on Sunday in Santa Clara near San Francisco could bring new record ranges. The previous record: more than 120 million people watched the NFL finale in New Orleans in 2025.
In the days before the duel between the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks it is becoming clear again and again how little the NFL cares about what Trump says. And this despite the fact that some of the 32 team owners are among the president’s supporters. League boss Roger Goodell is also in Trump’s orbit. “Fans are increasingly interested in which parties support players, coaches or team owners,” says political scientist Jake Grumbach from the University of Berkeley in an interview with RHEINPFALZ. The 38-year-old is a professor at the renowned Goldman School of Public Policy, researches the development of democracy in the United States and is a big sports fan. “The NFL is an extremely diverse league, it is disproportionately black. Black Americans overwhelmingly support the Democrats, but white football players also tend to lean towards the Democrats – despite some prominent Trump supporters,” he says. Superstar Nick Bosa from the San Francisco 49ers, for example, who appeared in front of the cameras during interviews wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat.

“I’m against them. I think it’s a terrible election. All they’re doing is sowing hate,” Trump said in a recent interview with the New York Post about what the NFL is planning to do at the Super Bowl, summing it up himself: “Terrible.” He was referring to the musical supporting program, which for many is just as important as the game itself.
Before kick-off, the Californian punk rock band Green Day
appear at their concerts, making no secret of their deep dislike of Trump or the controversial operations of the immigration authorities ICE. Green Day’s best-known song is “American Idiot,” in which the musicians criticize President George W. Bush’s “redneck agenda” and clearly express their opposition to the Iraq War