Mr. President, thank you so much for your time.
Thank you.
Hard to believe that the FIFA World Cup is coming to an end. You played such a role in bringing it here; what have been the highlights for you?
Well, I think my first meeting with Gianni, he's fantastic, the job he's done and he had this idea and I said, "That's crazy. We're not a soccer country." [Laughs] And it turns out we are a soccer country. We're a football country, but we don't wanna get it confused. But, uh, I don't think there's ever been anything like what's happened with, uh, the whole World Cup.
It's been beautiful. It's a beautiful thing to watch and I really give Gianni the credit.
It has been so special to see fans from around the world fall in love with our country, with America --
Yeah.
How proud does that make you?
Well, I watched, it started with Scotland, and all of a sudden they're doing things that nobody's ever seen, with the bagpipes, and it was beautiful and it just went to every country. Then they're realizing what a great country this is. Uh, we're the hottest country in the world right now for, this helped, but for a lot of other reasons.
We have trillions of dollars being spent in the United States. They're coming from all over the world and they're spending their money here. And we've never had a period of, I call it the golden age of America. It's amazing. Uh, but I'll tell you, the World Cup, uh, for, you know, this is your deal, right?
The World Cup. But the World Cup has really helped. It's been, uh, it's been tremendous. It's gotten the world, the word out --
Hm.
-- and nobody thought it was possible. I hear numbers that it's, uh, many times what's ever been done before. So that's great.
Uh, you're such a sports fan. We just had UFC at the White House. We have the Olympics coming and a big one on FOX, the Freedom 250 IndyCar race --
Right.
How much are you looking forward to it?
Well, Roger Penske's a friend of mine and he's been trying to get this race for 25 years. And he's had no luck in Congress. Congress is a tough place. And he said, "I've come here 212 times," or something, some massive number like that, and over many, many years. And he always went home empty-handed. He's not used to that.
He came see me, he said, "I saw Trump for 15 minutes and we had a deal done. And not only done, it's gonna be the best track you can imagine down Pennsylvania Avenue around the Capitol." That race is gonna be something. And I think they have 400,000 people already signed up. And we had UFC, which was their record they've never done.
I think it was the all-time fight record in front of the White House, at the front door of the White House. And some fights that were incredible. When you look at, uh, those last couple of fights, they were incredible actually.
Back to this FIFA World Cup, I gotta ask. Argentina, Spain --
Yeah.
Give me your prediction.
Well, I knew you were gonna ask, so I though about it very, very, I thought about it a lot. I knew that was a question. I hate to get involved, even though politically it doesn't matter so much. Uh, the head of Argentina's a friend of mine. He's done a terrific job. Uh, but I would say that it's hard to bet against Messi.
I watched that pass. I guess you'd call it a pass. It was exactly perfect. Although it takes some talent to hit the ball off the head coming at that speed. But that was perfect. If you had a strike zone, it was exactly where it had to be. And I watched also just before that the way he got away from the defender, he was very well defended.
All of a sudden he's standing by himself and he kicked it perfectly and it's hard to bet against him. So I, I won't pick sides. I just think it's very hard to bet against Messi. He's great.
Well, on that note, where does he rank in terms of all-time greats?
Well, I think, uh, he's great and Ronaldo's great. And I hate to say this, but I've watched Pelé when he was with the Cosmos. A friend of mine, Steve Ross, who headed up Warner, Warner Communications, and he was fantastic. And he brought soccer, he had a team, the Cosmos and they signed Pelé. I got to see Pelé play.
And he was great. Look, these are great players and, uh, and there's some others. Uh, look at France. He had a little rough game the last time, but what, you know, he's certainly one of the greatest. I get this information from my son. My son, Barron, is a, a tremendous soccer fan. Uh, but you have some other really incredible players playing here.
But I would say right now, when you look, uh, I mean, I've always liked Ronaldo. I've always liked Messi. I've met Messi just recently. And, uh, I have known Cristiano and, uh, they have a pretty good life. I think they have a very good life, actually. Much easier than my life, really.
[Laughs]
I'd like to have, I'd, I'd switch. I'd like to switch for about a month or so.
Yeah. Well, why would you like to see the FIFA World Cup back in America?
Well, I had an idea for Gianni, so he got it all started and, you know, I brilliantly said, "Well, we'll do it." But, uh, you know, it's, you could have a lot of empty stadiums. Didn't work out that way. I think I saw 99.9 and it's probably wrong because I think they were overflowing actually. But I had a great idea for Gianni.
I said, "You have to do two countries. So announce us again next time, and announce another country after that. It'll take out some of the anger and the shock."
Mm-hmm.
Now, I think it's a great idea, but based on the numbers, uh, we will be requesting it again immediately. But I said, "To take out the shock, you could announ- -- announce us and maybe then for the next one, another and even another. But we have to do this again and we have to do it while I'm around." You hear that, Gianni?
[Laughs] We gotta get Gianni's thoughts. Last thing, Mr. President. Why is sports so important in bringing truly the whole world together in this moment?
Just it's universal. It's been, uh, something from, I guess, probably pretty much the beginning of time.
Mm-hmm.
It's a, uh, microcosm of life. You win, you lose. But with sports, you see it over a two-hour period. In, in life, you go a whole life before they realize whether or not you're a winner or a loser. It's a long time. And now it's just something very special. And, you know, I know a lot about sports. I know a lot about athletes.
And with an athlete, generally speaking, you have to work in all of that. But bottom line, you either have it or you don't.
Yeah. Thank you so much, Mr. President.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
Enjoy this.
I will. I'm gonna have a good time. I'll be there.
All right. We look forward to seeing you.
Thank you.
Thank you.