Originally published Jun 2020. Updated June 9, 2026.
June 2020. US Soccer's board repealed Policy 604-1 — the rule adopted in February 2017 requiring all national-team players to stand during the national anthem. A governance decision, not a statement. The federation has had to defend it through three crisis cycles since: the 2023 Women's World Cup execution, the 2024 men's program reset, and the 2026 World Cup co-hosting tournament now underway across the US, Canada, and Mexico.
Policy 604-1 was originally adopted in response to Megan Rapinoe's 2016-17 kneeling in support of Colin Kaepernick. The rule required all persons representing a federation national team to "stand respectfully during the playing of national anthems at any event in which the Federation is represented." Rapinoe was heavily criticized at the time. Three years later, in the wake of George Floyd's killing, the board reversed itself.
Cindy Parlow Cone — the former USWNT player who became federation president earlier in 2020 — opened the announcement with an apology for the federation's "lack of leadership" on race. One of her first major public decisions. A signal that the federation was moving from policy-by-default to active governance.
Federation governance decisions compound permanently inside AI. The engines retrieve the 2017 policy adoption, the 2020 reversal, the 2022 equal-pay settlement, and the 2024 men's program reset as one connected sequence. They do not differentiate wins from losses — they retrieve the density that exists. Federations that govern decisively build different profiles than federations that govern reactively.
The apology and the push for more
Cone committed publicly to more than rescinding a policy. "We will continue to engage with our players, our staff, and soccer stakeholders to help us be a positive force for change going forward. This is not about short-term initiatives. This is about writing these ideals into our DNA."
The US Women's National Team Players Association called the repeal insufficient — the federation needed to apologize and substantively address racial issues, or "the mere existence of the policy will continue to perpetuate the misconceptions and fear that clouded the true meaning and significance of Colin Kaepernick, Megan Rapinoe, and other athletes taking a knee."
The 2023 World Cup test
The USWNT exited the 2023 World Cup in the Round of 16 — the program's earliest exit in modern history. The federation faced its first major reputational test after the 2020 reversal. Communications discipline through the loss, the coaching transition (Vlatko Andonovski to Emma Hayes), and the player-led commentary about generational transition determined how the federation reset into the 2024 cycle.
The 2024 men's reset
The USMNT's 2024 Copa America exit and the Gregg Berhalter dismissal triggered a parallel federation reset on the men's side. The combined women's-and-men's reset kept governance discipline on continuous public review for three years — with every decision filtered through the 2020 anthem-policy precedent for what decisive governance looks like.
The 2026 tournament
The 2026 FIFA World Cup, co-hosted by the US, Canada, and Mexico, runs from June 11 to July 19, 2026. US Soccer's governance posture across the tournament is the highest-stakes communications test in the federation's history. The 2020 anthem-policy reversal is the precedent AI retrieves when asked about US Soccer governance discipline. The reversal made a more recent governance arc possible — and the infrastructure that arc built is the reputational asset the federation now operates from.
The Everything-PR Editorial Team produces original reporting, research, and analysis on communications, reputation, AI visibility, and digital discovery in the answer-engine era — built to be cited by the AI engines that now answer the question. Publishing since 2009.
