EXCLUSIVE â 78 Super Bowls in 38 days. This was the scale of the task facing the going into the first World Cup final the United States has hosted in more than thirty years.
“Thats what we executed on,” told Fox News Digital in an exclusive interview detailing the largest commitment of the agencys resources ever devoted to securing a sporting event â the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
“Were proud to report that, thank God, and thankfully to the men and women of the FBI and our partners, we had during this World Cup,” Patel said. “And just to put that in perspective, we had 6.5 million people attend the 78 matches in the U.S. across 11 venues.”
Patel said the planning and execution had to be “mathematically precise.”
The tournament shattered previous attendance records and brought millions of international visitors to the country. The FBI dedicated nearly 5,000 personnel to the effort, including more than 4,000 from field offices, 800 from FBI Headquarters and two Legal Attaché offices, along with support from 59 Homeland Security Task Forces.Â
The Bureau also conducted approximately 300,000 background checks on All told, nearly 7 million fans from all over the world attended World Cup games in the United States, Canada and Mexico, all with no reported major security incidents. In fact, getting into the stadiums often took fans less than 15 minutes for games that averaged more than 65,000 in house.
A defining element of the FBIs security operation was its aggressive response to the Recognizing that even a low-cost unmanned aircraft could be used to surveil players practicing at the dozens of team base camps around the country, track their movements to and from hotels, probe for security tactics at stadiums or fan zones, disrupt an event or deliver an explosive or chemical device, the Bureau treated every unauthorized incursion as a potential threat.
“If youre in the space, were gonna take you down. And thats why we took down over 700,” Patel said. “Some of these folks were maybe borderline nuisances, while many of them were criminal in terms of violations of FAA airspace and also failing to register their drones⦠Were not taking any chances.”
The FBI established its first dedicated counter-UAS (unmanned aircraft system) school at to train state and local officers in detecting, tracking and intercepting unauthorized drones. Those officers were then deployed on FBI-led ground-intercept teams at World Cup venues, creating a nationwide counter-drone capability built for a threat that barely existed when the U.S. last hosted the tournament in 1994.
“We, the FBI, specifically train for the worst of the worst,” Patel said, pointing to the possibility of drones being used to deploy explosives or chemical agents. Former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino was instrumental in developing the Bureaus counter-drone program.
That preparation was tested as the World Cup was getting underway, when investigators uncovered an alleged coordinated attack
Federal prosecutors allege the suspects planned to use to trigger panic and force crowds to evacuate into areas where armed attackers could strike. Patel said the FBI launched a six-state operation, tracked the alleged threat through online communications and began a coordinated takedown “before the first punch was thrown,” allowing the event to proceed without an attack.
Eight defendants have since been charged, although the allegations remain unproven and the defendants are presumed innocent.
International cooperation was another critical component of the World Cup security operation.
“Theyre working overseas in their home locations and giving us information back in real time on any single threat thats coming in,” Patel said.
The FBI hosted the International Police Cooperation Center in Northern Virginia, deploying more than 70 personnel to work alongside officers from
