The White House has been accused of hypocrisy after it criticised UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer for 'putting lives at risk' over the kick-off time of England's World Cup match against Mexico, just one day after President Donald Trump overruled the same weather warnings to proceed with his Fourth of July speech.
White House Criticism of Starmer
Andrew Giuliani, son of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and head of the White House task force on the World Cup, appeared on TalkSport and was asked about allegations that Trump pressured FIFA to overturn a ban on US striker Folarin Balogun. Giuliani deflected the question, saying: 'I would go and point to something I think is a much graver decision that was made just a couple days ago. Keir Starmer's intervention through diplomatic channels of not allowing the Mexico-England match time to be moved.'
The match on Sunday faced calls for rescheduling due to a thunderstorm, which could have led to cancellation if lightning struck nearby. Ultimately, the game kicked off an hour late because of the storm. Giuliani also mentioned that after an earlier match, three Mexicans had died during celebrations, but this was due to asphyxiation, not weather.
Trump's Own Overruling of Weather Warnings
Just 24 hours earlier, Trump himself boasted on Truth Social about overruling a cancellation of his Fourth of July speech on the National Mall in Washington DC. 'The Crowd at 7:05 in the evening was 422,000 people. All were forced to leave because of the weather, the event was cancelled, and everyone was gone because of lightning. When I heard that it was cancelled, I immediately overturned that decision, and waited a while for people to come back,' Trump wrote.
Lightning strikes were visible during the 35-minute firework display that followed, but no casualties were reported. However, twelve people were taken to hospital due to high temperatures during a record-breaking heatwave that hit the US capital that day.
Accusations of Hypocrisy
Anna Sabine, the Liberal Democrat culture spokesperson, said: 'The White House must be suffering from a severe case of short-term memory loss. They are having a melt down over Keir Starmer intervening about a football match, completely ignoring that Donald Trump did the exact same thing 24 hours earlier to protect his Fourth of July firework display. What utter hypocrisy!'
