President Trump welcomes Messi, Inter Miami to White House to honor champions
President Donald Trump welcomed Lionel Messi and his Inter Miami teammates to the White House on Thursday to celebrate the team’s 2025 MLS Cup title.
The Miami players, dressed up in dark suits with the club crest, entered the East Room first. Trump then arrived flanked by Messi and the team’s managing owner Jorge Mas. The team stood behind Trump and watched as he began the event with an update on the war in Iran.
“We like champions, we like winners,” Trump began.
“The United States military, together with the wonderful Israeli partners, continues to totally demolish the enemy far ahead of schedule at levels people have never seen before. We’re destroying more of Iran’s missiles and drone capability every single hour…They set off a missile and within minutes the launcher gets hit and they don’t know what’s happening.
“We have the greatest military anywhere… Their navy is gone, 24 ships in three days, that’s a lot of ships … They have no air force, no air defense, all of their airplanes are gone. Their communications gone. Missiles are gone. Launchers are gone. About 60% and 64%, respectively. Other than that, they’re doing quite well.”
He added that the Iranians called to make a deal and he replied: “You’re a little bit late. We want to fight now more than they do. We’ve had 47 years of horror with this group.. We really had no choice... In the long-term, the actions we’re taking will dramatically increase the stability of the region.”
He then turned his attention to the defending MLS champions, who were in town to play DC United at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore on Saturday.
“We’re honoring truly talented people,” Trump said. “It’s my distinct privilege to say what no American president has ever had the chance to say before: Welcome to the White House, Lionel Messi.
“My son said, ‘Dad, do you know who’s going to be there today?’ I said, ‘No, I got a lot of things going on.’ He said, ‘Messi.’
“He’s a big fan of yours. He thinks you’re just a great person. And I think you got to meet a little while ago. So he’s a big soccer fan, but he’s a tremendous fan of yours. And a gentleman named Ronaldo. Cristiano is great. You’re great.”
Trump compared Messi to Brazilian legend Pele and said he remembered watching Pele play for the New York Cosmos in the 1970s.
In addition to praising Messi, the President mentioned Luis Suarez’s performance during the Club World Cup, Tadeo Allende’s record-breaking playoff performance, and also singled out Rodrigo De Paul.
As he introduced the players, he joked: “Do you have any bad-looking players? I like the bad-looking players much better.”
At one point during his remarks, Trump said to Messi: “You could have gone anywhere in the world. You could have chosen any team in the world. You chose Miami and I don’t blame you. The weather’s pretty nice.”
Mas presented Trump with a pink No. 47 jersey to commemorate his presidency. Messi then gave him a signed ball, and coach Javier Mascherano was on hand as they presented Trump with an engraved watch.
Mas, whose entire family was in attendance, shared impassioned words about his Cuban heritage.
“As the son of a man and woman who left Cuba, just seeking freedom in this great country, it has driven us to excellence,” Mas said, in discussing Inter Miami’s success. “We thought, `What can we do that’s special?’ I said, `We are going to bring the world’s greatest player to play in Miami. That was in 2019. And today, standing before you, you have the world’s greatest player standing to my right... We’ve been on an epic run of trophies and winning.”
Mas then took a moment to pay tribute to his mother, Irma, who attended the ceremony, and his late father, Jorge Mas Canosa, .
“These were men and women who fled Communism, fled tyranny, wanted a better life for their boys, daughters and sons in the future and at our dinner table it was instilled in us that if you work hard, and you sacrifice, and you dream, it can be possible,” Mas said.
Also attending the ceremony were MLS commissioner Don Garber, Andrew Giuliani, head of the White House’s World Cup task force and retired baseball star Alex Rodriguez.
Trump then invited the team to join him in the Oval Office, describing it as the “center of the world … especially now.”
This story was originally published March 5, 2026 at 6:45 PM.