{"podcast":{"title":"The Tara Palmeri Show","slug":"the-tara-palmeri-show-7313277","podcast_index_feed_id":7313277,"rss_url":"https://feeds.megaphone.fm/thetarapalmerishow","website_url":null,"image_url":"https://megaphone.imgix.net/podcasts/2752238a-2058-11f0-ab29-137fd2d0370e/image/e6b90ba68a5d318a9e9a593ddd57f402.jpg?ixlib=rails-4.3.1&max-w=3000&max-h=3000&fit=crop&auto=format,compress","author":"TaraPalmeri.com","episode_count":296,"summary":"Welcome to The Tara Palmeri Show! Tara Palmeri is one of the most feared and fearless political journalists. As a deeply-sourced reporter, she brings her audience inside the machinations of the highest level of power. Her quick wit and unvarnished reporting goes beyond the headlines, offering a deeper understanding of the intrigues of the permanent political class. This show is not about platitudes. Rather it's about what’s really happening at the highest levels of power and the inside conversation. Tara has covered national politics and foreign affairs for fifteen years. She was formerly a White House Correspondent for ABC News, where she covered the first Trump administration. She was the Chief National Correspondent for POLITICO during the Biden administration. She has been a political analyst for CNBC, CBS and CNN. She’s also worked for the Washington Examiner, the New York Post, POLITICO Europe and Puck, and she hosted The Ringer's election podcast \"Somebody's Gotta Win.\" Tara also hosted two acclaimed podcasts on Jeffrey Epstein called \"Broken: Jeffrey Epstein\" and \"Power: The Maxwells.\" Subscribe to her weekly newsletter The Red Letter on Substack Support her independent jo…","last_synced_at":"2026-07-25T20:20:50.307364+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-tara-palmeri-show-7313277"},"episode":{"title":"From Putin to Trump: 5 Times FIFA Bent the Knee","slug":"from-putin-to-trump-5-times-fifa-bent-the-knee","published_at":"2026-07-19T15:00:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-tara-palmeri-show-7313277/from-putin-to-trump-5-times-fifa-bent-the-knee","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-tara-palmeri-show-7313277","url":"https://tracking.swap.fm/track/JhoQDAATtO1l0y8tdKNa/traffic.megaphone.fm/ADL9033070577.mp3","audio_url":"https://tracking.swap.fm/track/JhoQDAATtO1l0y8tdKNa/traffic.megaphone.fm/ADL9033070577.mp3","summary":"FIFA calls itself the guardian of the world's game — but pull back the curtain, Tara Palmeri argues, and it looks less like a sports body and more like a global power broker where politics and money matter more than soccer. In this documentary-style breakdown, Tara is joined by Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter Ken Bensinger, author of \"Red Card: How the U.S. Blew the Whistle on the World's Biggest Sports Scandal,\" to walk through FIFA's most damning chapters. They trace the through-line of patronage: Russia's bribe-fueled 2018 World Cup and Gianni Infantino's full-throated embrace of Vladimir Putin (who awarded him the Order of Friendship at the Kremlin); the 1978 tournament staged in Argentina under a murderous military dictatorship; Qatar 2022, won through bribery and built by migrant workers who died by the thousands, then defended by Infantino's surreal \"Today I feel Qatari, today I feel a migrant worker\" speech; and the engineered 2034 process that cleared every rival so Saudi Arabia could win unopposed — shortly before state oil giant Aramco signed a massive FIFA sponsorship. Finally, they get to the 2026 World Cup on North American soil, where — for the first time in 60 years — a red-card suspension was overturned, not through a referee appeal, but after President Trump personally called the FIFA president. Bensinger explains why, given everything about how FIFA operates, that stunning reversal was almost inevitable — and how Infantino's cultivation of Trump, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia keeps the money flowing and his grip on power secure. 0:00 – FIFA as a global power broker: meet reporter Ken Bensinger 0:43 – Russia 2018: bribes, sanctions, and Infantino's embrace of Putin 1:49 – Argentina 1978: a World Cup under a military dictatorship 2:13 – Qatar…","meta_description":"FIFA calls itself the guardian of the world's game — but pull back the curtain, Tara Palmeri argues, and it looks less like a sports body and more like a…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":642,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-tara-palmeri-show-7313277/episodes/from-putin-to-trump-5-times-fifa-bent-the-knee/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-tara-palmeri-show-7313277/from-putin-to-trump-5-times-fifa-bent-the-knee.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}