ARLINGTON, Texas – In the run-up to the 2026 World Cup, politicians around the country have complained they’re being asked to foot the bill for transportation and security, while sky-high ticket prices make it impossible for locals to attend the matches.
You won’t hear that argument from Jim Ross, the mayor of Arlington, Texas. His city has spent hundreds of millions on professional sports stadiums over the last three decades — including the NFL venue that’s been renamed Dallas Stadium as it prepares for the World Cup’s busiest schedule.
Voters have approved the spending three times, twice for baseball stadiums and once for the football stadium.
The community of 400,000 has hosted a World Series, a Super Bowl, the final four of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament and a Taylor Swift concert. If that’s not enough, there’s a Six Flags theme park and a water park near the stadiums.
Ross, a former Arlington police officer, spent part of his career providing security at baseball games. He later went to law school and was elected mayor in 2021 and 2026 as an independent (municipal elections in most of Texas are technically non-partisan). Ross said he became a soccer fan when his youngest daughter played the sport, watching FC Dallas in Major League Soccer.
He comes down squarely in favor of professional sports — and the hundreds of millions that the city has spent to subsidize them — arguing that AT&T Stadium alone provides $324 million in annual economic benefits to local businesses. And he’s not worried about the $8.5 million in World Cup-related expenses Arlington has racked up – he expects the state and federal governments will reimburse the city.
There are still critics. Game-day traffic around the stadiums can be a nightmare, and some residents question whether the city really really benefits from the public spending on sports venues.
And for fans, getting to the stadium can be a challenge. And Arlington is the largest city in the U.S. without a mass transit system, although the city sponsors a ride-share system.
The transportation agencies that serve Dallas and Fort Worth don’t extend into Arlington, but local officials cobbled together a system that will ferry fans to the stadium using a combination of a regional commuter rail and buses.
Driving to the games? Expect to pay hundreds of dollars for parking.
The first of six group-stage matches kicks off Sunday, with the Netherlands taking on Japan. Argentina, the defending World Cup champions, will play Austria on June 22 and Jordan on June 27.
Ross talked with POLITICO about pros and cons of hosting professional sports, high ticket prices, transportation and other issues, along with his plans for the cup.
Does it irk you at all to have the stadium renamed for Dallas?
A: Listen, I love Dallas, they are great neighbors, but Arlington is my city, and we’re very proud of what we’ve done here in Arlington. Did I have a number of communications with FIFA about the naming of the stadium, and, and what it should be called, and shouldn’t be called – yeah.
The President of Mexico famously gave away her free ticket as a protest, the mayor of New York whooped and hollered about ticket prices, until FIFA put some relatively cheap tickets up for sale. Is that a concern for you, that regular folks are being priced out of the games?
It’s a concern for me that regular people are being priced out of games on all fronts. I mean, I’ll be candid, you, whether you go to a UFC fight, whether you go to a football game, baseball games, and all that stuff, it’s difficult.
I don’t set ticket prices for anything, anywhere. I certainly want everybody to have an opportunity to enjoy the games and to be a part of it, and I think there’s a number of avenues by which they can do that. (FIFA is giving away free tickets to veterans and first responders, and local charities have access to some tickets.)
Would you take the kind of risk that Mayor Monda Mamdani did — you know, jawboning and seeing if you could get lower price tickets for the fans here?
We’ve had discussions like that, with FIFA, not just ticket pricing.
If I had a city the size of New York, maybe we can get more people to listen to us on things. But we don’t, you know … we’re a smaller big city.
One of the other complaints that’s popped up around the country is, FIFA didn’t do cost sharing for security and other expenses this year. Has that been a problem for you?
We expect significant reimbursement from our federal and state partners on this, and there’s been money set aside to do just that. In fact, I was at the governor’s mansion last Monday with the mayor of Dallas, and when I was leaving there, Governor Abbott reassured me again. He was like, “Mayor, you call me if you need anything else from a public safety perspective, during the games.”
The other thing that’s popped up, you know, whether it’s the Olympics or the World Cup, and so forth, is whether big sporting events are a benefit for the host cities. Is it worth the city’s expense to have these stadiums out here and do these big events?
I’ll give you an example of just having AT&T (AT&T Stadium, the NFL venue where the Cup games will be held). AT&T gives an economic benefit to the city of Arlington of $324 million a year. That’s not the city of Arlington’s cash register ringing, that’s every small business around, their cash register ringing.
Another thing that’s been a problem around the country is transportation to the stadiums. Arlington is, famously, the biggest city in the country without a mass transit system.
A: Arlington doesn’t have a transit problem as much as North Texas has a transit problem.The problem is the transit authorities were developed to address transportation within certain regions, but not necessarily throughout the (whole) North Texas region.
The Dallas system moves people in and out of downtown Dallas, and the Fort Worth system moves them in and out of downtown Fort Worth?
Exactly right.
You worked the stadiums as a police officer – what did you learn about crowd control from that experience?
Crowds feed off of each other. Yeah, you know, if you take a small issue … and you handle it in a horrifically aggressive manner, you can spark a much bigger issue.
I think understanding crowds and the controlling of crowds is an art and a skill that takes highly trained people. I would argue that Arlington PD probably does it better than most, because we have more experience in it than almost any city around.
The Rangers won the World Series (in 2023), and we had over 700,000 people hit the streets in Arlington, and about 10 arrests were made with 700,000 people on the streets. I think that speaks volumes for how our PD handled the crowds.
Does having an international crowd change the dynamics at all?
The Netherlands have a tradition of doing a fan march, and that’s where they bring tens of 1000s of fans, and they march to the stadium. Not all of those fans will necessarily have tickets to get in, but that’s part of their tradition and their celebration, and all that.
So we’ve had to coordinate with the Netherlands and work with them on doing the fan march, talking to them about what is involved in that, and helping them understand here’s what the laws are here in Texas.
I’m probably going to go out there for the Netherlands fan march and participate with it, because culturally speaking, this is so important for Arlington.
And will they be waiving the open container laws during the fan march?
Ah, don’t get me lying.
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