Former FIFA vice president Jack Warner, who is on bail on bribery charges, wasn’t laughing as he cited a work of satire published in the Onion on Sunday.
In a video posted on his official Facebook page (it was subsequently taken down but appears to have been reposted by YouTube user rpmackey here), Warner blasted an ongoing U.S. Justice Department investigation into his alleged malfeasance at FIFA and brandished a printout of an article published in the Onion to bolster his position.
The article, entitled “FIFA Frantically Announces 2015 Summer World Cup in United States,” was published hours after U.S. authorities commenced a sweeping corruption probe into soccer’s international governing body on Wednesday that indicted several of the association’s top officials, including Warner, who is from Trinidad and Tobago.
The mocking suggestion of the article is that FIFA would be willing to organize a “summer World Cup” simply to appease U.S. authorities. However, the satirical point was lost on Warner. He asks why the U.S. would be willing to host such an event “if FIFA is so bad.”
Warner is currently facing extradition to the U.S.
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