Philly Congressman Angers U.S. Soccer Fans — All 11 of Them

"It is of course fitting that 90 percent of my tweets are about immigration reform, health care, foreign policy, and of course, a tweet about soccer is the thing that gets paid attention to."

ICYMI, the U.S. soccer team suffered an embarrassing 2-1 loss to Trinidad and Tobago last night, meaning we’ll miss out on playing in the World Cup for the first time since 1986.

But it’s OK, America, because U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle was there to offer his hot take on the sport last night:

And then he learned that you should probably never offend die-hard soccer fans. Even if there’s only, like, 11 of them:

https://twitter.com/AJC97Oxford/status/917978013702197248

https://twitter.com/DBURN4/status/917973345488068608

https://twitter.com/NeuDM/status/917965043375005696

We spoke to Boyle on the phone this morning, probably while he was still receiving more angry Twitter mentions and even a call for his removal from office. Boyle said he was just having “a little bit of fun,” and that he’s come to learn that soccer fans are “a bit of a defensive bunch.”

“I’m representative of a typical American sports fan in that I will watch the World Cup to root for the U.S., and then once the World Cup is over, and the U.S. is out of it, I generally don’t pay attention to soccer until four years later,” Boyle said.

“The fact that I am not a big soccer fan, and the fact that soccer today is not one of the major sports the way baseball and football are, I don’t think that should detract from others who love it,” he added. “If someone weren’t a big NFL fan, that wouldn’t detract from my enjoyment of watching the eagles on Sunday.”

https://twitter.com/RepBrendanBoyle/status/917948088945438720

On the other hand, Boyle said, if the Philadelphia Union were playing in their championships, he’d definitely watch that. He’d probably also tune in to the World Cup if Philly hosted the game at the Linc in 2026 (which it might).

In the meantime, it’s back to policy tweets for Boyle.

“It is of course fitting that 90 percent of my tweets are about immigration reform, health care, foreign policy, and of course, a tweet about soccer is the thing that gets paid attention to,” Boyle said.

He’s probably right about that one.

https://twitter.com/ZackKopplin/status/917953009107292160

Follow @ClaireSasko on Twitter.