For the past 11 years, I've waited for a scandal, a slip up, a moment of clarity that would finally make President Donald Trump's supporters realize that their man is charlatan.

My fellow Americans, I think we finally found it.

Earlier this week, Trump appears to have successfully lobbied FIFA to allow U.S. striker Folarin Balogun to play in this week's round of 16 match against Belgium despite the player receiving a red card in the previous match, which in normal times would've made him ineligible to play.

We, of course, do not live in normal times — and naturally, it took a pivotal World Cup game for our notoriously xenophobic president to suddenly strike a blow in favor of birthright citizenship.

The 25-year-old Balogun was born in this country to a Nigerian mother who came here while seven months pregnant and stayed because airlines wouldn't allow her to board any flights home. He left the U.S. at 2 months old and only returned as an adult three years ago to play for our national soccer team.

It's the type of scenario Trump and his minions have railed about for years as to why birthright citizenship should be banned, an issue Trump vows to continue to pursue even though the Supreme Court last week ruled it constitutionally protected.

In a lifetime spent as a case study showing how craven and selfish someone can be, Trump's FIFA gambit was ne plus ultra Trump.

Stand up for principles until they're no longer convenient. Demonize people until you can use them. Don't let things like rules and decorum get in the way of what's in it for him. What Trump thinks is good PR for himself is what matters.

Surely, seeing Trump abandon one of his most important crusades in order to try and sway the outcome of something as seemingly inconsequential as a soccer match would sour supporters on him once and for all?

If only!

His supporters have clamped their mouths tighter than the federal budget for diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. White House deputy press secretary Kush Desai waved off the double standard as an "asinine observation" in a NewsNation interview.

Trump infamously bragged that he could shoot someone in Manhattan and "wouldn't lose any voters," describing such devotion as "incredible." Well, Trump worship is looking more and more like a death cult as the midterms approach. Everything the man is touching nowadays turns into gold for him and rot for the rest of us, a curse any smart person would avoid.

And yet his most zealous followers just lap it up. There is no turning this bunch. Trump is their golden calf.

Trump earned nearly $2.2 billion last year in personal gains, according to recently released financial disclosures. Meanwhile, Americans continue to pay small fortunes for groceries and gas because of his Iran disaster. Staging an Ultimate Fighting Championship event in front of the White House last month lost the company $30 million and left UFC president Dana White vowing to never stage something like that again. But hey, if President Nero says "Let the games begin!" then games there will be.

After Trump's intervention, the U.S. men's soccer squad got destroyed by Belgium 4-1 yesterday. Maybe Team USA should have just gone into the game with a giant chip on their shoulder after losing Balogun via an unfair red card; maybe that would have given them an edge.

Maybe the last thing they needed was for President Hot Air to meddle. (Trump insists he only asked FIFA to review the red card, but let's be real: FIFA president Gianni Infantino has so far shown a predilection toward sucking up to Trump with the skill of an Erling Haaland scoring a header).

Instead, the U.S. squad played listlessly. An exciting World Cup run mucked up by a president for whom muck might as well be a currency.

Trump's hold on too many Americans is frankly dangerous. Like meteorologically dangerous.

Just look at people who attended Trump's Fourth of July festivities at the National Mall and refused to heed evacuation orders during thunderstorms, dismissing them as a liberal conspiracy against their guy and chanting "U.S.A., U.S.A" at an officer commanding them to leave.

Trump supporters need to realize once and for all that the only thing he cares about is himself — and such onanism is becoming worse. As we reach the halfway point of his second term, his overriding concern is not to better the economy or bring good times to the American people, but to be remembered as an American Caesar, someone whose name will be spoken of in equal parts awe and fear for centuries.

That's why one of his obsessions during his second term is building new monuments, slapping his name and image on buildings around Washington, D.C., gilding as much of the White House as possible and trying to twist history into a narrative that posits him as our country's savior.

How does any of that help anyone but himself?

And it's only the start. Trump has announced he wants to present the trophy to the World Cup winner at the end of the finale scheduled for July 19. And Infantino has already announced that that will be the case . Trump has already accepted a set of Olympic medals from LA 28 chair Casey Wasserman and will preen as a man of consequence for the world when the Games come to Los Angeles in two years.

But the historical figure Trump reminds me most of is Ozymandias, the namesake of Percy Bysshe Shelley's immortal poem warning despots about how fleeting power is by describing the ruins of a statue that once depicted an Egyptian pharaoh. "Nothing beside remains," Shelley wrote. "Round the decay/Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare/The lone and level sands stretch far away."

May that not be what's left of the United States on Election Day 2028 after Trump's historic run of collecting red cards that have brought shame upon our country across the world stage.

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