FIFA is under fresh scrutiny for sky-high World Cup ticket prices and sales tactics that fans say left them with worse deals than they wanted.
The attorneys general in New York and New Jersey, which is hosting eight World Cup matches including the final, announced Tuesday that they are investigating whether FIFA’s ticketing practices violated consumer protection laws.
They have sent subpoenas to soccer’s global governing body demanding information on a range of ticketing issues, including FIFA’s use of “variable pricing” models that sent ticket prices soaring for most matches and redrawn stadium maps that fans say relocated their seats far from the pitch.
FIFA has been here before. In May 2015, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted nine FIFA officials and five sports marketing executives on charges of racketeering, wire fraud, and money laundering — one of the most sweeping corruption prosecutions in the history of professional sports. The charges, built over years by federal investigators, alleged that officials had accepted more than $150 million in bribes in exchange for broadcasting and marketing rights to major soccer tournaments. Several officials pleaded guilty; FIFA’s longtime president Sepp Blatter resigned within days. The organization pledged structural reform. A decade later, these two attorneys general, working with the New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, say they are focused primarily on ticketing practices for matches at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey.
“New Yorkers have been waiting years for the World Cup to come to their backyard, and they deserve a fair shot at affordable tickets,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said. “No one should be manipulated into paying sky-high prices for seats, and fans should be able to trust that the tickets they purchase will be the ones they receive.”
New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport accused FIFA of turning the act of buying a World Cup ticket “into a gauntlet of confusion, fake scarcity, and impossibly high prices.” It’s an honor for New Jersey to host the World Cup, she said, “but the event is not an invitation to exploit our residents and visitors.”
FIFA declined to comment.
The World Cup kicks off June 11 with matches in Mexico City and Guadalajara, Mexico. The first match at the roughly 82,000-seat MetLife Stadium — temporarily renamed New York New Jersey Stadium for the event — pits Brazil and Morocco on June 13.
Some seats for the July 19 final are going for nearly $33,000.
Last week, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced that 1,000 tickets — about 150 tickets for each MetLife Stadium game, excluding the final — will be made available to city residents via a lottery system at a cost of $50 each.
FIFA previously made some $60 tickets available for every match, distributing them through the national federations of the teams playing in the games.
[Nick Lichtenberg contributed reporting on the FIFA indictment of 2015.]
