From the 250th to July Fourth to the World Cup, Trump’s shadow looms over America’s summer

The joy went out of U.S. fans after a dismal exit from the World Cup against Belgium on Monday. Photo by Frederic J. Brown /AFP

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Americans wanted a summer of fun. They got a giant Donald Trump cage fight instead.

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Team USA’s ejection from the World Cup at the hands of Belgium on Monday underlined the souring of the national mood already underway since divisive July Fourth celebrations.

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It was about more than the 4-1 score or occasionally embarrassing lapses in skill.

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These U.S. players had previously charmed Americans. In a nation that doesn’t care much for soccer, vast crowds sang the cheesy, sunny song “Country Roads” to motivate their heroes. And social media brimmed with foreign fans admiring the U.S. way of life.

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But even before taking the field in Seattle, the plucky group found itself under an ugly, Trump-sized cloud.

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The president’s extraordinary intervention with FIFA to reverse a red card against star player Folarin Balogun had yanked them deep into Trump’s harsher political arena.

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And while Trump got Balogun to play, the vibes had died.

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Belgians were outraged. Prominent soccer figures worldwide were dismayed. U.S. fans had split into the same bitter pro- and anti-Trump camps already facing off in every other sphere.

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“We went from… a World Cup that made everyone fall in love with all distinctly American parts of our daily life to reminding everyone why 90 per cent of the global population hates us,” Rob Dauster, co-founder of prominent college basketball media network The Field of 68, posted.

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U.S. President Donald Trump called FIFA chief Gianni Infantino to discuss the red card against a star U.S. player. (ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP/File) Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS /AFP/File

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Another sports writer, Shane Ryan, said the most direct fallout of the scandal around Trump was on the team itself.

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“This team had a boatload of good vibes behind them, and in the last 48 hours, that vanished, and replacing it was a story of implicit political corruption that turned them into the bad guys.”

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Even a pro-Trump commentator, Sage Steel, wrote on X: “I wish President Trump hadn’t gotten involved.”

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Promise of joy

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Just two days earlier, the country had struggled through a Fourth of July where Trump’s abrasive presidential style transformed the most unifying of holidays into political combat.

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The Republican’s holding of a mixed marital arts contest in a specially constructed cage at the White House the previous month set the tone.

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Above is the UFC Freedom 250, the Trump administration’s spectacle of hosting a mixed-martial-arts match on the grounds of the White House as one of several events to mark the United States’ 250th birthday. Photo by Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images

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Then came his war over the Reflecting Pool, a once benign feature on Washington’s National Mall where Trump improbably claims leftist radicals are sneaking in to destroy expensive upgrades that he ordered.

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Finally, on Saturday — the 250th anniversary of American independence — Trump marked the day by sprinkling his celebration speech on the National Mall with crude insults against opponents and dark claims of a looming communist threat.

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He’d done the same thing a day earlier at another shrine to U.S.  togetherness, Mount Rushmore.

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That’s why amid all the politicization, the U.S. team’s showdown with Belgium had promised something happier.