A CONTROVERSIAL Arizona immigration law which lets authorities randomly stop and question people of Latin American appearance and check their citizenship documents is threatening to derail the United States’ bid to host the 2022 FIFA World Cup.
In another boost to Australia’s bid to host the tournament in 2022, the US is struggling to control a wave of disquiet throughout the Americas over the radical law, which has sparked protests by sporting groups and boycotts by performers within Arizona.
The law is proving particularly damaging to the bid as the city of Glendale, Arizona, is one of the main host cities the USA has proposed for World Cup group matches.
Some members of the powerful Central and South American football confederations are reluctant to play in a state where their citizens could face harassment, or simply oppose the law as a matter of principle.
Latin American news sites began running hard on the story last month when the NBA basketball team The Phoenix Suns changed the name on their team jersey from “The Suns” to “Los Suns” for a play-off game as a nationally broadcast protest against the law.
“It rings up images of Nazi Germany,” Suns general manager Steve Kerr said of the law, which has also been condemned by the San Antonio Spurs, the NBA Players Association and the Major League Baseball Players Association.
Performers Shakira, Kanye West, Carlos Santana, Willie Nelson and Hall and Oates have all cancelled scheduled concerts in Arizona.
The Mexican Football Federation announced last month that it would support the US in its World Cup bid, with obvious spin-offs given its proximity to the US and the proposed scheduling of pre-tournament friendly games in Mexico.
But many Mexican soccer fans have jumped on blog sites to condemn that decision as unprincipled and opportunistic, and other sporting groups in Latin America are agitating against it. The Mexican World Boxing Council, representing the second-biggest sport in Mexico, has placed a ban on competing in Arizona and denounced the law as racist.
And one of the strongest attacks came on The Huffington Post blogsite this month with the late ex-president Ronald Reagans former deputy Attorney-General Bruce Fein saying the Arizona law should preclude the US from hosting the tournament.
“What’s galling about Arizona’s prominent placement in the US bid is that soccer’s popularity is at its zenith in the Spanish-speaking world,” Fein wrote.
“The US should be denied the privilege of the global extravaganza unless Arizona repeals its unconstitutional and ugly statute criminalizing the absence of federal immigration papers and targeting racial or ethnic minorities who “look” foreign.”
The southern border state is a hotspot for people smuggling from Mexico and in the past 12 months anti-Mexican sentiment has also increased as drug violence has crept north of the border.
The controversy over the law is the latest and biggest headache for the USA’s bid, which was damaged this month when Football Federation Australia chairman Frank Lowy made the tactically shrewd decision to pull Australias bid for the 2018 tournament and concentrate on 2022, leaving the US still lobbying for 2018 and 2022.
FIFA boss Sepp Blatter has said the 2018 World Cup should be hosted in Europe and Mr Lowys withdrawal of our 2018 bid won a rare public endorsement from FIFA for Australias “exemplary” conduct, impressing the eight European members of the 24-man FIFA executive which will announce the winning bidders on December 2.
The US bid is also hampered by the fact that it already hosted the World Cup in 1994, leaving cashed-up Qatar, which would be the first Muslim nation and Gulf state to host the tournament, as our chief rival for 2022.
Be the first to comment