By Karolos Grohmann
PYLOS, Greece (Reuters) – International Olympic Committee’s newly-elected President Kirsty Coventry wants to sit down with United States President Donald Trump to make sure the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics are successful, she said on Thursday.
“President Trump is a huge supporter of sport. There’s never been a sitting president that has attended the Super Bowl,” Coventry told Reuters in an interview following her election victory on Thursday.
“He was the president at the time when LA was awarded the Games (in 2017). I truly believe that he wants the LA 28 Games to be a huge success.”
Coventry, who is Zimbabwe’s sports minister, as well as Africa’s most decorated Olympian, said both the IOC and the United States wanted successful Olympics in three years time.
The LA Games present a major commercial opportunity, with the IOC seeking to create new sources of revenues, and the American market presenting new opportunities with the first summer Olympics in the United States in more than 30 years.
Since taking office on January 20, Trump has announced a number of executive orders that focus on stricter border entry requirements, tighter visa vetting procedures and a crackdown on undocumented immigrants in the United States.
Several IOC members on Thursday who said they had long waits for U.S. visas expressed concerns over entry regulations for athletes travelling to the LA 2028 Olympics, asking U.S. Games organisers for clarifications, given Trump’s hardline border policies.
“It will take sitting down and having a good conversation with him,” she told Reuters, adding that she believed “sharing with him our values and where we want to be, how we want LA to be successful and being very clear on the different priorities (within the IOC).”
POTENTIAL RIFTS
Trump has banned transgender athletes from competing in sports in schools in the United States, which civil society groups say infringes on the rights of trans people. Trump has said he would not allow transgender athletes to compete at the LA Games, but the IOC currently allows transgender athletes to take part in the Olympics.
Trump’s executive order also instructed the State Department to pressure the IOC to change its policy, which allows trans athletes to compete under general guidance preventing any athlete from gaining an unfair advantage.
The IOC in 2021 urged each of its federations to draw up their own gender participation rules, so there is no one universal rule for sport. Coventry said the federations would need to resolve the matter.
“What we need to do… is bring the international federations together and the IOC, and try to take a joint decision on how we will protect the female category,” Coventry said.
When asked if clear guidance would be issued prior to next year’s Milano-Cortina winter Games to avoid a dispute similar to the one that overshadowed the Paris 2024 Olympics over the participation of two female boxers, she said it was something that needed to be looked at.
“I need to have the next few days to see how things line up. But when we look at it and sit down we will come up with a timeline,” Coventry said.
She takes over from outgoing president Thomas Bach on June 24.
(This story has been corrected to add a missing word in paragraph 8)
(Reporting by Karolos Grohmann; Editing by Aurora Ellis)
