US President Donald Trump during an announcement in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Friday, Sept. 5, 2025. Trump made official his intention to host next year's Group of 20 summit at his Doral resort in south Florida, with plans to curtail the attendee list and focus talks on the economy. (Photo: Francis Chung / Politico/Bloomberg via Getty Images) The news broke Thursday, six months exactly before the start of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, which the U.S. is co-hosting with Mexico and Canada.
The Customs and Border Protection agency, a wing of President Donald Trump's Department of Homeland Security, submitted proposed changes to the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) per a notice posted in the Federal Register, the official journal of the U.S. government.
"In order to comply with the January 2025 Executive Order 14161 (Protecting the United States From Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats), CBP is adding social media as a mandatory data element for an ESTA application. The data element will require ESTA applicants to provide their social media from the last 5 years."
It's unclear exactly how the social media reviews would occur or what specifically would cause the government to interfere with a foreigner's entry into the country.
But the rule would apply to 42 countries that participate in the "U.S. Visa Waiver Program," which includes the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Germany, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Belgium, Australia and New Zealand.
FIFA has not commented on the matter.
"If you're going to start disallowing people from coming on vacation to the United States because their politics might be a little bit left of center, the economy is going to be hit in a bad way," Matthew Guariglia, a senior policy analyst for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, told Front Office Sports.