Iran’s World Cup Team Divides Diaspora in LA’s ‘Tehrangeles’

**SPEAKER_1** (0:02)
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio, News.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:07)
You're listening to Bloomberg Businessweek with Carol Massar and Tim Stenovec on Bloomberg Radio.

**Tim Stenovec** (0:14)
I want to shift gears a little bit. We're talking about sports, gambling, a lot of it happening when it comes to World Cup or sports betting.
There are some parts of Los Angeles that are sometimes dubbed Tehrangeles because the region is home to the world's largest Iranian diaspora community. Well, almost everyone in this expatriate enclave opposes the current Iranian government. Many retain a loyalty to their national soccer squad. It's known as Team Melli.

**Carol Massar** (0:38)
Yeah, that squad's first game in the 2026 World Cup ended in a draw yesterday in LA. That was against New Zealand. Then it was a two to two.
John Gittelsohn has been following all of this.

**Tim Stenovec** (0:50)
He's Bloomberg News Los Angeles Bureau Chief. He spent some time during the game in a cafe. He was also in a hookah bar. Getting an idea of how members of the Iranian diaspora community came together and put politics aside for about 90 minutes. He joins us from LA. I love this story, John. It's a little bit of a departure from the traditional stuff that we're seeing you cover, but you get to cover a lot as LA Bureau Chief.
What did you find happened during this game? And actually, you know what? Scratch that. I'm gonna call an audible here.
As Tom Keane says, before you do that, just tell us why LA is home to so many Iranians.

**John Gittelsohn** (1:25)
Yeah. Hi, Tim. Hi, Carol.
It started more than 50 years ago, before the Iranian Revolution. A lot of people came here from Iran to study engineering in Southern California, at USC and UCLA. And then when the Revolution hit, they were like, where can we go in LA? Well, we know people in LA. I mean, where can we go to escape the revolutionaries and keep our money? And they knew a lot of people in LA. And so they joined, created this community here. And especially around UCLA is where it's really concentrated. And there's a lot in Beverly Hills. A few years ago, there was a reality TV show called the Shaw's of Beverly Hills. That was like about these princeling princesses who were the second generation of, you know, the Persian exile community, as they refer to themselves.

**Carol Massar** (2:23)
I may have watched an episode or two. Just, you know, kind of homework to try and understand, you know, reality TV as it continues to spread its wings.

**SPEAKER_1** (2:31)
All right.

**Carol Massar** (2:31)
So tell us what you found out, because are most people, you know, in terms of the community agree on what's going on in the country and their opposition to the government?

**John Gittelsohn** (2:44)
I mean, the people came here as refugees, as asylum seekers, as just exiles. And I have never run across somebody who's like, I really like what the regime in Iran is doing.
The people who are here, so they turned out in by the thousands and danced in the streets when the US and Israel first attacked Iran. They've been really disappointed with the way the war has gone. And several people I talked to are, you know, really unhappy that there's a truce right now. And they feel like maybe they're getting sold out, like the big losers are the people in Iran.
But when it comes to football, there are people who like, my heart is still in Iran and the team is still Iranian. And so I cheer them on and, you know, it's my people. We are all one on the football field.

**Tim Stenovec** (3:45)
And was it like that yesterday at the at the coffee shop at the hookah bar?

**John Gittelsohn** (3:52)
Yeah, at the hookah bar at the coffee shop and people I talked to who are in the stadium said it was, you know, like that. They were like, it's electrifying. It's Iran's game. You know, people were cheering. They were wearing like red, white and green fright wigs. There was a lot of debate over the flag. There are people who are pro-Shah, pre-revolutionary government and pro-democracy who don't like the current Iranian flag. And they smuggled in replicas of the old flag or they wore t-shirts underneath their shirts that they exposed or various ways to try and get the symbols to show that they were not supporting the government. But at the same time, they were screaming and cheering every time there was an attack on the goal by Iran or putting their hands over their ears and shrieking posture when there was a threat by New Zealand to score.