Sen. Tom Cotton reveals why he called for a boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics
Arkansas Republican reveals his concerns over U.S. athletes competing in the Olympics in China on 'The Story.'
Starting this week, China’s genocidal prison state will host the 2022 Winter Olympics. But it didn’t have to be this way – the Games could easily have been delayed or moved.
Instead, the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the Biden administration, and hypocritical executives gave the Chinese Communists what they wanted: the honor of hosting the games and the chance to spread their propaganda across billions of television screens.
The world’s greatest athletes will now parade through a stadium that is a mere five-hour train ride away from the Wuhan lab, the likely origin of the coronavirus. America’s youth will compete for medals before Communist Party officials responsible for a horrific genocide of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang. Athletes will be watched, followed, and surveilled every waking hour of their stay in the most repressive police state in the world.
TUNE OUT THE WINTER OLYMPICS, DON'T REWARD COMMUNIST CHINA'S SCHEME
The International Olympic Committee never should have awarded the 2022 Winter Olympic Games to China. The country’s repressive behavior was well known when the Games were awarded in 2015.
In 2020, the IOC should have moved the games after the Chinese Communist Party covered up its responsibility for the coronavirus, which has now killed millions worldwide. And if that wasn’t enough, the IOC should have stripped China of hosting responsibilities when governments around the globe acknowledged that China was committing genocide against the Uyghurs and had thrown more than one million of its own people in concentration camps.
Relocating the 2022 Olympics was eminently possible both in 2020 and 2021. The Winter Olympic Games are far smaller and easier to move than Summer Games. The Winter Games include one-third as many sports, roughly 700 fewer medals, and less than half the competing countries. Many Western democracies could accommodate the games on short notice.
But instead of showing courage, the IOC kowtowed to the Chinese Communist Party.
President Biden has shown similar weakness. He refused to act for months after his State Department upheld the Trump administration’s finding that China was engaged in genocide. In December, to quiet his critics, the president announced a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Games. This toothless response will have virtually no effect on the event.
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To protect our athletes and protest China’s crimes, President Biden should have announced a full boycott of the Olympics. None of our diplomats, companies, or athletes should have been allowed to attend or promote the event. Instead of rallying the world against these Genocide Games, Biden did the bare minimum. Americans expect better of their commander in chief.
And where are the preening woke CEO’s who loudly defamed Georgia’s election integrity bill? Their self-serving outrage was so strong that the MLB stripped Atlanta of the 2021 All-Star Game. Why have we not heard from our self-anointed moral betters about the horrors in China?
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It turns out that fake outrage comes cheap, but real courage comes at a price. That price is too high for woke corporations like Coca-Cola, Airbnb, and Procter & Gamble, who are happily sponsoring the 2022 Games. Billions in profits apparently aren’t enough to buy them a conscience.
If cowardice becomes an Olympic sport, representatives of the IOC, the Biden administration, and corporate America are guaranteed a place of honor at the medal ceremony.