Olympic officials meeting Wednesday in Switzerland took a calm, longer view of the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles after days of images of deployed military and burning cars on the host city’s streets.
IOC president Thomas Bach praised the strength of the city’s community and the umbrella group of 36 sports that Los Angeles will host in just over three years’ time also expressed faith in a shared wish of all levels of government to unite for the Olympic project.
“With regard to LA, we have the full support of the president of the United States and the governor of California and the mayor of Los Angeles for the success of these Olympic Games,” Bach told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
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That despite President Donald Trump suggesting this week he would support the arrest of Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has pushed back hard on federal government officials in the wake of an immigration crackdown that ignited tensions in the city.
The U.S. government has deployed National Guard and Marines in the city where police have used rubber bullets and tear gas — a repeat of June 2013 scenes that flared in Rio de Janeiro three years before the Brazilian city hosted the Olympics.
London also saw turmoil on the streets exactly one year before it hosted the 2012 Summer Games, provoked by a police shooting in a neighborhood close to some Olympic venues.
“These are the ups and downs” for Olympics organizers, said Sebastian Coe who led the London organizing team from its bid through to hosting successful Summer Games and Paralympics. “You just have to roll with it”
“I spend a lot of time there,” Coe, who owns a home in Los Angeles, told the AP on Wednesday. “The problem is with 24-hour circulating news you see the same car burning every 20 minutes. It tends to make people think your whole city is up (in flames). And it’s not.”
Bach and Coe, the president of track and field’s World Athletics, spoke on the sidelines of the annual meeting of the Summer Games sports bodies group, known by the acronym ASOIF. It got an update from a two-person delegation from Los Angeles.
The “ultimate priority right now” for the LA organizing team is finalizing the daily schedule of competition events in 2028, Nico Campriani, its vice president of sports told delegates.
Leaders of the 36 Olympic sports had no follow-up questions on current events in the city.
“The IOC cannot comment on domestic political controversies,” Bach told the AP, citing the Olympic body’s policy of neutrality.
“It’s a strong city,” said the IOC leader whose presidency ends in 12 days’ time. “You saw this in the reaction after the wildfires where then the Olympic Games were also considered by the community as a catalyst for the rebuilding.”
Bach will be formally succeeded June 23 in Lausanne by Kirsty Coventry, the Olympic gold medalist swimmer and now-former sports minister of Zimbabwe, who won an election in March to be president through 2033.
A priority for the first female and African president in the IOC’s 131-year history will be planning a meeting with President Trump.
Federal government guarantees on funding security and processing visas for the July 14-July 30 games in 2028, and subsequent Paralympics, were needed to be awarded the Olympics in 2017 during the first Trump administration.
Putting faith in LA 2028 and IOC leaders, ASOIF president Ingmar de Vos insisted they would “do the necessary” work in ongoing relationships with all levels of government.
“I am also believing very strongly in the state and the city and the people of Los Angeles,” De Vos said. “They want these games.”
