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FIFA Denies Belgium's Red Card Appeal, USA Star to Play Tonight; Russia Launches Deadly Attack on Kyiv Ahead of NATO Summit; Trump Prepares to Depart for Critical NATO Summit; Government Will Use Same Reflecting Pool Contractor for New Repairs. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired July 06, 2026 - 13:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[13:30:00]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: -- to the decision by FIFA that has stunned the soccer world. Ahead, the latest on the backlash to that call as Team USA's game is now just hours away.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Back now with more on the red card scene around the world. Tonight, Team USA takes the pitch in Seattle with their star striker, Folarin Balogun, after a reversal of his red card suspension. Just minutes ago, FIFA rejecting Belgium's appeal of that decision. All of this following the buzz that's been building over a controversial phone call President Trump made to FIFA's president.

Earlier, Trump saying that he asked Gianni Infantino on Thursday to review this red card ruling. Infantino, just a short time later, acknowledged the conversation, but said he often gets calls from world leaders, and that he told Trump an investigation into the controversial play was already ongoing.

[13:35:00]

Let's discuss with CBS Sports Golazo Commentator, Chris Wittyngham. Chris, always great to see you. Let's start at the beginning with the play that got us here. Walk us through what happened between Balogun and that Bosnian defender.

CHRIS WITTYNGHAM, CBS SPORTS GOLAZO COMMENTATOR: Yeah, so he's kind of falling over and is losing his balance and his foot ends up planting on the ankle of the opposition defender, Tarik Muharemovic, who is a very good player in the game and defended Balogun. Those two were getting after each other the whole game.

And that context is worth knowing because it was a situation where I do think that the game played a role in the fact that it was not given as even a yellow card on the field. It was a very physically contested game. Both teams are getting after it. The referee was letting a lot go and this is a moment where Balogun is not really in control. And that sort of is one of the things that's being talked about a lot.

It's not in the rules. The rules say endangering the safety of an opponent. Now that could take a number of forms. You can intentionally try and go in and hit him, or you can just kind of end up losing your balance and falling on a player. And ultimately, VAR, the referee and the video assistant referee decided that this should be a red card.

This is a very controversial decision in the minds of many who watch soccer week in, week out, not just at the World Cup and then there, of course, the people who do just join in for the World Cup who also thought this is incredibly controversial, apparently including the president.

SANCHEZ: If you were to don the -- I guess, he was wearing teal, the referee there. I'm used to referees wearing, you know black and white stripes. But if you were to don the referee uniform and make the call, would you have called this a red card?

WITTYNGHAM: I can see an argument for it. I can see argument for it only because of the outcome. The outcome when you look at in slow motion, which is another part of this, is you see studs on the ankle and the ankle is bending. That's usually pretty bad. But I think if you take into account the entire context of the game, if you take into account the entire context of the referee's decisions in the game and what ultimately, the player is doing and just sort of falling over needing a place to put his foot, I don't think that that was a red card decision.

So I think reasonable people, including people not from the United States, that don't have any say in how they feel or it's -- they're not emotionally invested in quite the same way, have said that that was probably an outrage of a decision even. So I would personally say no red card, although I can understand how they got there.

SANCHEZ: You mentioned the fact that replay had something to do with this. Is it possible that seeing this in slow motion made it seem worse than it was? And I ask this being a total neophyte when it comes to what you call football or would you, you know, we joke about this being soccer versus football -- hand egg, it's what you would call American football. But from an from an expert, is it possible that seeing this on replay ultimately led to a red card, that wasn't even there when the play initially happened?

WITTYNGHAM: I'm surprised people have fixated so much on this because the idea that slow motion is not used in VAR decisions is frankly ridiculous. We see it all the time. VAR has been in place since the 2018 World Cup in Russia. And from that moment on, we have seen slow motion used in every possible scenario to make these decisions. So yes, it does say in the official guidelines that you're not meant to use slow motion as a means of determining anything other than a fact, meaning did the ball go out of play? Did the ball cross a line? Then you can say, well, let's use slow motion to very clearly see the exact moment it went over the line.

But in moments where you're meant to be determining the sort of severity of a challenge something like that, you're meant to watch it in full time and at regular speed. It seems a little bit pedantic to say that because they looked at it in slow motion that someone (ph) makes it invalid. I think you always look at freeze frames. You always look at slow motions anytime they show a decision There was one last night in the Mexico-England game, really hard tackle, defender goes over the ball with his stud showing goes into the ankle. They look at it in slow motion to make sure that it goes into the ankle and they show the referee the angle in slow motion.

But I don't think anyone is saying that that was an incorrect decision because they used slow motion. So I think it's a little bit of a ridiculous way of trying to get around what was a decision that the referee and the VAR made. I don't understand the slow motion talking point if I'm being honest.

SANCHEZ: I also want to ask if you think that the U.S. wins tonight, and whether a win and perhaps further advancement in the tournament may be now tainted because of the White House's intervention?

WITTYNGHAM: Yeah, it's hard not to feel that way on the basis of the fact that Gianni Infantino, the President of FIFA, has had such a strong relationship with Donald Trump and with the White House for a long time going back to even Donald Trump's first term. He played such a big role in how the World Cup in the United States was going to look, the hosting rights were, obviously, you know, a big topic of conversation around that 2018 period right after Russia.

[13:40:00]

What would come after that? How would it look here in the U.S.? And those two have formed such a big relationship that now, this sort of once-in-a-lifetime exception -- the last time a suspension was not handed down was 1962. It's hard not to feel like this was an exception that was on the basis of a personal relationship, but we don't know that. And so, I think as a U.S. fan, it's hard to feel like, I'm going to stop rooting for it, it's going to feel tainted.

You're watching the games, ultimately, kick off tonight, you're thinking about the game, you're not thinking about all the other stuff that goes on around it. So, I'm not going to feel that way, but I can understand why a lot of people around the world feel that way about that decision.

SANCHEZ: I defer to an expert like you. Chris Wittyngham, thank you so much. USA! USA!

WITTYNGHAM: Thanks, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Of course. So we have some new details about Prince Harry's big return to London this week. It turns out he's not going to be staying at Buckingham Palace while there, despite his team saying just this morning that he'd accepted an invitation. A royal source tells CNN the prince didn't respond to his father's invite by the required deadline, which was last week, and that now it's too late for the palace to make arrangements for the appropriate hospitality and staffing. It's unclear at this point where the prince will be staying, in ahead (ph).

Still to come, Russia launching deadly attacks on Ukraine on the eve of a critical NATO Summit, just two days after a phone call between Vladimir Putin and President Trump. The latest on that conflict right after this.

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[13:46:00]

SCIUTTO: Right now, and once again, Ukraine is just reeling after a new round of punishing Russian aerial attacks overnight. Deadly blasts hitting in and around Ukraine's capital, Kyiv. Officials there say the strikes killed at least 19 people. Just hours later, Ukraine launched its own attacks on Russia, damaging Russia's largest fuel refinery. You see it burning there. Ukrainian drones hitting deep, yet again, into Russian territory.

As the country is suffering a major fuel crisis, gas stations are seeing long lines at nearly every region. They are now dealing with shortages. Tomorrow, NATO leaders are meeting in Turkey to discuss, among other things, a potential path out of this war. Joining me now, former Defense Intelligence Agency Official, retired Army Major, Harrison Mann. Good to have you.

MAJ. HARRISON MANN (RET.), FORMER DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY OFFICIAL: Thanks.

SCIUTTO: So first, it's not the first time, certainly, Russia has attacked Ukraine in recent weeks with just a punishing mix of missiles and drones. But doing it on the eve of the NATO Summit, is that a deliberate message in your view?

MANN: Yes, this is to combat Ukraine's narrative, which is that they're finally on the up and up. They finally got Russia on the ropes, I think most visibly demonstrated by this recent slate of attacks in Moscow, which are really meant to show that Ukraine has a future in pushing back Russian forces.

And so, this is Putin showing, no, guess what? We're still here and we can deal back anything double that Ukraine throws at us.

SCIUTTO: Now, Russia is deliberately trying to take advantage of a shortage of air defense missiles in Ukraine. There's a reason why they just pummel, fire more missiles, some of them are going to get through. It was notable because Zelenskyy -- because Ukraine said last night, it did not -- or was not able to intercept a single ballistic missile because of shortages of those Patriot interceptors. I mean, that's quite a vulnerability.

MANN: Yeah, and this is something that he's been asking for more of the entire war, of course. Now, what's changed is that the United States used up much of its stores in the Iran War.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

MANN: Which means that probably, you know, regardless of how Trump is feeling about Ukraine on a given day, there's just not that much to send to anybody.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. MANN: And I mean, I think it speaks to kind of the larger trajectory of this war, which is it's going to depend a lot more on what European allies and European manufacturing can do for Ukraine, especially as Trump has shown that he's not going to be necessarily a reliable ally in this conflict.

SCIUTTO: Well, there's also just a problem, like you use them faster than you can make them, right? And that's the trouble with the supply chain. Just last week, I spoke with the CEO of one of Ukraine's leading drone defense companies. And as you know, Ukraine has made enormous advances with drones to the point where now, well, the U.S. and other countries are asking for Ukraine's help there.

But I asked him about how much, in effect, that drone expertise can replace things like air defense missiles, Patriots. And he said he's not confident Ukraine can hold if the war continues like this and if those Russian attacks continue like this. Fair assessment, in your view?

MANN: I don't know because, you know, these Patriot missiles that they want from the U.S., these are strategic weapons. These are for defending population centers, for defending industry. I don't think they have a ton of impact on the front lines, which has largely been drones and basically World War I-style infantry combat.

And so, you know, I think in terms of resolve, in terms of domestic political support for the war in Ukraine, these air defenses matter. But in terms of trying to push back Russian forces, I don't think they're going to have that much of an operational impact.

SCIUTTO: We have two things, right? Because they're making -- they've basically frozen the front line with these drone capabilities here, but they can only defend so much against these kind of relentless waves of Russian missiles. So you have the NATO Summit coming tomorrow.

I've been speaking to European officials for the past year, and they've expressed first privately, but now you see this quite publicly, that they don't really trust the U.S., or certainly not to the degree they did in the past. What do you think the best outcome of this summit is with President Trump visiting?

[13:50:00]

MANN: From the European perspective, I would hope that they finally internalize the lesson that Trump keeps, in his own way, trying to teach them which is that Trump administration is not a reliable partner and European defense ultimately will need to depend on European capabilities and I think more importantly, European will.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

MANN: And so on one side, we've got like the Mark Rutte strategy of saying, Daddy Trump, and trying to placate the president I think that that can work sometimes, but it's not a long-term strategy. So I'm curious to see if they're willing to be more assertive this time than last year's summit.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. I mean that's -- the thing is, how long it takes them, right, to fill that void. Isn't it because the U.S. is just such a powerful country, you can't -- they can't backfill that so quickly it seems.

MANN: Yes. Well, so there's the technological and defense manufacturing aspect which does take time and Europeans, to their credit, have stepped that up. But there's also them figuring out things that don't necessarily cost as much money, which is what does fighting a war without the United States look like.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

MANN: What does command-and-control, fires coordination, intelligence look like if we are not fully dependent on the Trump administration, and that's something that they could do faster and not necessarily without a lot of, you know, technological or industrial development major.

SCIUTTO: Major Harrison Mann, good to have you on.

Well, the Trump administration says the same company which renovated the Reflecting Pool will actually repair it. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:56:03]

SANCHEZ: So the Trump administration says the same company that was given a multi-million dollar no-bid contract to renovate the Reflecting Pool will tackle its already much needed repairs.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. Is that the way we would do our own pool, do you think?

SANCHEZ: I don't know about that.

(LAUGH)

(CROSSTALK)

SCIUTTO: I don't actually, but in a dream world where I did. In the weeks since that renovation, the pool's lining appears to have become detached in several places. Yesterday, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum doubled down on the administration's claim that damage is the result of vandalism.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT AND ANCHOR OF 'INSIDE POLITICS': And you're 100 percent sure that what happened with the liner was vandalism? You can prove it?

DOUG BURGUM, UNITED STATES SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR: Oh, yeah, absolutely, we can. And as we drain it, we've got all the photographs, we can see. I mean, there's no possible way --

BASH: Are there photographs of a person or people cutting a 300 or 350 foot gash in the bottom of the Reflecting Pool?

BURGUM: Dana, I'm not sure why you and others in the media think that you want to keep trying to question whether or not -- I think this is an industrial liner. Every farmer and rancher in America that's had their pickup liner lined by this sprayed-on liner knows that you literally, literally, it would never just like peel off or fall off.

This is like a strong material.

BASH: Yeah.

BURGUM: And it's the size of eight football fields. And the only way you can end up with actual slices in one spot and not the other is that someone physically cut it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: CNN's Sunlen Serfaty has reported extensively on the project. So Sunlen, here we are talking about a pool renovation. What's the latest? What's happening with the repairs?

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, potentially as early as today, sometime this week, the Reflecting Pool will be drained again. And this is to do those renovations that the president and the interior secretary have promised, the repairs to the liner, the repairs to the bottom, that paint that was seen chipping up. And notably, we learned this weekend that the administration has now gone into another contract with Atlantic Industrial Coatings.

This was the company that originally received that no-bid contract, $14 million contract to do the original round of repairs. And given that we have been talking about this Reflecting Pool for weeks because of the algae, because of the paint chipping, because of the alleged vandalism, there was a question whether they would take on this next round of renovations. So, indeed, they will be doing that.

And I spoke just a short time ago to the president of this company, asking him for details about when his part of the renovations would start. He said he has not been told anything yet, nothing's been set yet, and declined to answer questions about the extent of his contract, whether it's in addition to the contract, or is it part of that original $14 million? Big questions over how much this next round of renovation is costing the country.

SANCHEZ: Part of the reason that, to address what the secretary said, there are so many questions about this alleged vandalism, is that the Reflecting Pool is massive and it is constantly under surveillance. There are 24/7 cameras on it, so you would be able to see someone cutting the lining for 300 feet or so. Why has the administration not released any of that footage if it supposedly happened?

SERFATY: It's a great question, and we have asked many of these questions, not received the answers to. Many of the 360, 24/7 views of the cameras, that was installed after some of the alleged vandalism did take place. That was brought in by the administration in response to what they say is alleged vandalism.

But Burgum said that the government could absolutely prove that this was vandalism that caused the damage to the Reflecting Pool, but they have not put out that firm evidence, that photograph. And you heard Dana doing a great job questioning the interior secretary over the weekend, if they would put those photographs forward, but as of now, they have not.

SANCHEZ: Also important to point out, no one that has been charged in connection with any of the alleged crimes surrounding the Reflecting Pool has actually been charged with cutting a 300-foot gash in the lining. We'll see if those charges someday come. Sunlen Serfaty (inaudible).

(CROSSTALK)

SCIUTTO: Hope we see the evidence as well.

SANCHEZ: Fair point.

A new hour of "CNN News Central" starts right now.

SCIUTTO: Red card reversal. A star player for Team USA will now get to play in tonight's game --