History has not reflected kindly on Brundage, whose legacy is marred by his antisemitic and racist views. But his insistence on keeping politics out of the games still animates the Olympic ethos. In a speech last year, current IOC president Thomas Bach urged politicians to “keep politics and sports apart.”
Bach hit that same note at a press conference on Tuesday while responding to the Palestinian Olympic Committee’s call to bar Israel from the Paris games.
“We are not in the political business, we are there to accomplish our mission to get the athletes together,” Bach said.
Hoberman said that Bach is relying on the same doctrine of Olympic neutrality formulated by Brundage nearly a century ago. “It’s clearly expressed that, for the good of humanity, sports and politics must not be mixed up,” Hoberman said.
The neutrality of the games was later codified in Rule 50 of the Olympic Charter, which states: “No kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas.”
That prohibition has come under fire in recent years. In 2021, a group of more than 150 academics, activists, and former Olympians—including Smith and Carlos—signed an open letter calling for changes to Rule 50.
The IOC reviewed and ultimately opted to uphold the rule, but the governing body also issued new guidelines allowing athletes to “express their views” on the field of play prior to the start of a competition, so long as the expression isn’t disruptive or targeted “against people, countries, [organizations] and/or their dignity.”
That opened the door for some previously forbidden displays at the COVID-delayed Summer Olympics in Tokyo, where a number of women’s soccer teams kneeled prior to their matches as a statement against racism. But organizers were wary of other gestures. Raven Saunders, who won the silver medal in shot put that year, formed an “X” with her wrists while on the podium in Tokyo, prompting an investigation by the IOC. Saunders, who is Black and gay, said that the gesture represented “the intersection of where all people who are oppressed meet.” (The IOC dropped its investigation after Saunders’s mother died two days following the event.)
Molly Solomon, the executive producer and president of NBC’s Olympics broadcast, said the network covered all of those moments in Tokyo, and that there are no rules to avoid political topics when reporting at the games.
In Paris, Solomon said, NBC plans to spotlight athletes from Ukraine, and that the network will be “watching for Israeli and Palestinian athletes,” but those stories will be told “through the prism of sports.”
After all, she said, the Olympics provide a detour from the political arena.
“We’re just a few months before what looks like the most divisive presidential election,” Solomon told me. “I’m looking forward to the 17 days in late July and early August when, in my mind, all of that takes a back seat.”
Solomon said she doesn’t expect much in the way of political statements from the athletes in Paris. Neither does Hoberman, though he suspects Bach is “worried” there will be.
“Don’t expect political activism from high-performing athletes. It rarely happens,” Hoberman said. “The reason why Tommie Smith and John Carlos are immortal is because what they did was foundation-smashing.”
Tarazi, meanwhile, said she has no interest in doing anything that violates the Olympic charter. And despite her commitment to highlight the deteriorating situation in Gaza, she believes sports and politics should be separate.
“At the end of the day, we are all just athletes here. We just want to play our sport,” Tarazi said. “Yes, of course, I want to use my platform and spread the message, and I do believe it’s my responsibility to do that. But I’m here to swim. I’ve been training 20 years of my life for this.”
