Haiti made it back to the World Cup this summer after a 52-year absence. In Brooklyn, that meant a party. Haitian fans packed cafes in Flatbush and Crown Heights. Mexican and Ecuadorian supporters filled Sunset Park. Thousands turned out across the borough to cheer their national teams, according to BK Reader, which reported on watch parties spreading through immigrant neighborhoods during the 2026 tournament.
In Bushwick, the scene got loud. Hundreds of fans spilled into the streets for Mexico’s match against Czechia, wearing lucha libre masks and lighting fireworks, BK Reader reported. Joel Silva, who recently moved to Brooklyn from Houston, watched the game in the neighborhood and told the outlet the crowd felt like home.
“We have a big Mexican community in Texas, but it feels really good to have just as much as a community here in New York,” Silva said, per BK Reader. “So it feels really welcoming and really like home base. I know more than half of these people have work tomorrow, and right now nobody cares.”
Mexico, which is co-hosting the tournament for the third time, advanced past the knockout phase for the first time in 40 years, according to BK Reader. Fans gathered at the Football Cafe pop-up on Gardner Avenue in Bushwick to watch the team, and at El Santo, also in Bushwick, where crowds took in games on June 19.
For Haitian fans, the run meant more. Haiti went out in the group stage. The diaspora felt disappointed and proud, BK Reader reported. Alex Stephen, who rooted for Haiti at Lakou Cafe in Crown Heights, told the outlet the team could have gone further but that showing up together changed the story people tell about his country.
“We’re being seen in another light, because all they know about Haiti is gang and insecurity,” Stephen said, per BK Reader. “But being able to be at a stadium with everybody, chanting, dancing, partying, it’s like there’s another side of Haiti that people can see.”
The pride cut across nationalities. Aliffer Zamira Sabek, who is from Venezuela, told BK Reader she went to games in Haitian neighborhoods specifically to support Haiti, tearing up as she explained why.
“I am specifically supporting Haiti because they are the first free Black nation,” Sabek said, according to BK Reader. “Haiti actually helped liberate Venezuela, so part of my own culture and my own upbringing is to know that my own country became free because of Haiti. Multiple countries owe their freedom to Haiti.”
The celebration came at a hard moment. BK Reader reported that the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to remove Temporary Protected Status for thousands of Haitians. Brooklyn’s Haitian community is facing uncertainty. One fan, identified as Nelson, told the outlet the tournament’s visibility had pushed the issue in front of people who might not otherwise have paid attention, and that he had seen more support from outside the diaspora than he expected.
Others talked about how people see immigrants. Jorge, a Mexico fan from Puebla who declined to give his last name, told BK Reader in Spanish that the crowds in the street were making a point.
“We came all the way from Puebla, and from every state, to represent our beautiful Mexico,” he said, per BK Reader. “We’re here to show that we came to work, to fight for our dreams, and honestly, we aren’t here to cause harm, but to help each other out.”
Fans also gathered for a watch party at Herbert Von King Park in Bed-Stuy on June 19, BK Reader reported, as Mexico prepared to face England.
