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olympics
US Women's Olympic Hockey Champs Decline Trump SOTU Invite
"Another win for the US women’s hockey team," said California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Feb 23, 2026
The gold medal-winning US women's Olympic hockey team has declined an invitation from President Donald Trump to attend the State of the Union address in Washington, DC on Tuesday.
In a statement given to NBC News, a spokesperson for USA Hockey said that while the team was "sincerely grateful for the invitation extended to our gold medal-winning US Women’s Hockey Team and deeply appreciate the recognition of their extraordinary achievement," its members could not attend "due to the timing and previously scheduled academic and professional commitments."
The team's decision to decline an invitation to the State of the Union came one day after Trump was heard telling the US men's hockey team, which also won the gold medal at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan, Italy, that he would be forced to invite the women's team to the White House or risk being impeached.
"I must tell you, we’re going to have to bring the women’s team, you do know that?" Trump told the players on Sunday.
This resulted in the men's team breaking out in laughter.
The women's team's decision to not attend Trump's speech drew quick praise from Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is widely expected to seek the presidency in 2028.
"Another win for the US women’s hockey team," he wrote in a social media post.
Activist Charlotte Clymer argued that Trump's ridicule of the women's team showed just how little his attacks on transgender women athletes had anything to do with a sincere appreciation for or desire to "protect" women's sports.
"Weird how Trump has spent the past several years falsely claiming trans youth are an existential threat to women’s sports," she remarked, "and then mocks the US women’s hockey team after they won gold because he thinks it’ll play well with the guys during a locker room celebration."
She also urged the men's hockey team to decline Trump's invitation in solidarity with their fellow gold medal-winners.
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US Athletes School Trump in the Olympic Spirit
When Trump attacked one of their own for speaking his mind, Olympians stood up in support of their colleague.
Feb 12, 2026
US President Donald Trump has a long history of trashing athletes. So when he aimed his viciousness at US Olympians participating at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics, perhaps it should not have been a surprise. The response from US athletes has been fierce and firm: They will not be intimidated by the petulant president.
When a journalist asked US freestyle skier Hunter Hess what it was like to represent the US in this particular political moment, Hess replied: “It’s a little hard. There’s obviously a lot going on that I’m not the biggest fan of, and I think a lot of people aren’t. Just because I’m wearing the flag doesn’t mean I represent everything that’s going on in the US.” The Olympian added that he had “mixed feelings” about representing the US.
In response, Trump hopped on Truth Social to attack the athlete, mangling the US skier’s actual words along the way. “U.S. Olympic Skier, Hunter Hess, a real Loser, says he doesn’t represent his country in the current Winter Olympics,” Trump punched out with his chubby little posting thumbs. “If that’s the case, he shouldn’t have tried out for the Team, and it’s too bad he’s on it. Very hard to root for someone like this.”
Not only did Trump misrepresent what Hess conveyed, but he cued his MAGA ghouls and powerful supporters that it was time to unleash their vitriol. Right-wing boxer wannabe Jake Paul posted: “Wow pls shut the fuck up. From all true Americans. If you don’t want to represent this country go live somewhere else.” US Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) piled on, “Any person who goes to the Olympics to represent the United States and then says they don’t want to represent the United States should be immediately stripped of their Olympic uniform.”
The IOC just can’t seem to grasp the obvious reality that their thin veneer of institutional "neutrality" tends to benefit the already powerful at the expense of courageous upstarts.
To say this does not exactly embrace the goodwill that the Olympics are supposed to stand for is to make an enormous understatement. Trump wouldn’t recognize the Olympic spirit if it came up and kissed him on the cankle.
Meanwhile, Olympians have stood up in support of Hess and other athletes who are willing to embrace the political complexity of the moment. Chloe Kim, the superstar snowboarder from the United States, said, “It’s important in moments like these for us to unite and kind of stand up for one another with what’s going on.” She added, “I’m really proud to represent the United States. The US has given my family so much opportunity, but I also think we are allowed to voice our opinions on what’s going on.”
Eileen Gu, the two-time gold-medal-winning freestyle skier who herself experienced scorn and abuse when she decided to represent China, rather than the United States, at the 2022 Winter Olympics, said: “I’m sorry that the headline that is eclipsing the Olympics has to be something so unrelated to the spirit of the Games. It really runs contrary to everything the Olympics should be.”
After winning a silver medal in cross-country skiing, Ben Ogden said, “I choose to believe that I live in a country where people can express their opinions without backlash.” He added: “Certainly not... without backlash from the president. And that was really disappointing to see, but I hope it doesn’t continue like that.” Fellow US cross-country skier Zak Ketterson also pushed back: “I think it’s pretty childish to come at somebody for exercising their free speech, right, and considering that side of the political spectrum always champions free speech, it’s a little, I think, surprising to see them so triggered.”
US curler Rich Ruohonen, who is also an attorney from Minnesota, leaned on the law, noting, “We have a constitution, and it allows us freedom of speech.” He added: “What’s happening in Minnesota is wrong. There’s no shades of grey. It’s clear.” This follows fellow Minnesotan Kelly Pannek, a member of the US women’s hockey team, who said she drew inspiration from activists in her home state: “I think people have been asking a lot of us what it’s like to represent our state and our country. I think what I’m most proud to represent is the tens of thousands of people that show up on some of the coldest days of the year to stand [at protests] and fight for what they believe in.”
Meanwhile, the International Olympic Committee has remained conspicuously quiet. Rather than standing up for Olympic athletes and their free speech rights, the self-proclaimed “supreme authority” of the games has sat silent.
When asked about Trump’s behavior at a Milan Cortina 2026 press conference, IOC spokesman Mark Adams said, “I am not going to add to the discourse because I don’t think it’s very helpful to heat up any discourse like that.” So much for the IOC’s slogan “putting athletes first.” According to the IOC’s most recently available tax documents, Mr. Adams makes $528,615 in reportable compensation (and another $100,838 in additional compensation from the IOC and related organizations), but apparently that isn’t enough to inspire him to do his job right.
Perhaps the IOC is too busy clamping down on Ukrainian skeleton athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych for wearing a helmet commemorating athletes from his country who were killed in the war with Russia. Or maybe they are still admiring their handiwork from when they forced the Haitian delegation at the Milano Cortina Olympics to remove the Haitian revolutionary Toussaint Louverture—the former slave who led a revolution that created the world’s first Black republic in Haiti in 1804—from their uniforms, arguing that Louverture’s image violated Olympic rules barring political symbolism.
The IOC just can’t seem to grasp the obvious reality that their thin veneer of institutional "neutrality" tends to benefit the already powerful at the expense of courageous upstarts. In sitting silent in the face of Trump’s attacks on athletes, the IOC is facilitating the slide toward authoritarianism. With the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics on the horizon, it’s time for the IOC to wake up from its bumbling slumber.
Trump’s attacks on star US athletes is part of a larger pattern. After all, this was the grump who attacked Megan Rapinoe during the 2019 World Cup, tweeting, “Megan should never disrespect our Country, the White House, or our Flag, especially since so much has been done for her & the team.” Six years later, Trump is at it again. Rapinoe refused to back down. May these athletes continue to show the collective courage to do the same, to stand up to power.
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Thousands Take to Milan Streets to Protest Olympics' Environmental and Social Harms, ICE
"I’m here because these Olympics are unsustainable—economically, socially, and environmentally," said one elderly protester.
Feb 08, 2026
Around 10,000 demonstrators rallied in Milan Saturday to protest the economic, social, and environmental impacts of the Milano-Cortina Winter Olympics, the presence of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at the games, genocidal Israel's participation, and other issues.
The union and activist network Comitato Insostenibili Olimpiadi, or Unsustainable Olympics Committee, organized the demonstration, which it called "a popular gathering of social opposition, bringing together grassroots and community sports organizations, civic and environmental movements, territorial committees and student collectives."
The coalition said it is "fighting for the right to housing and for militant trade unions, movements that have stood alongside the Palestinian people, and the Global Sumud Flotilla," the seaborne campaign to break Israel's blockade of Gaza.
Protesters also decried Decree Law 1660, which empowers police to preemptively detain people for up to 12 hours if they believe they may act disruptively, as well as "state racism against migrants and racialized people, and transfeminist anger against social and institutional patriarchy."
At the vanguard of the protest march were about 50 people carrying cardboard trees representing larches they said were cut down to construct the new bobsleigh track in Cortina d'Ampezzo. They held a banner reading, "Century-old trees, survivors of two wars, sacrificed for 90 seconds of competition on a bobsleigh track costing €124 million."
Stefano Nutini, a 71-year-old protester, told Reuters that "I’m here because these Olympics are unsustainable—economically, socially, and environmentally."
"These Olympic Games are against nature and against people." Thousands of people marched through Milan to protest housing costs and urban affordability on the first day of the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics. pic.twitter.com/iPcpXwuvQN
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) February 7, 2026
One healthcare worker at the protest told Euronews: "It's public money that has been spent on a display window. It may be interesting to have these showcase events, but at a time when there is not enough money for essential things, it makes no sense to spend it in this way."
Another demonstrator said that the Olympics "have not brought any wealth to the city of Milan and Lombardy."
"They have taken money away from social welfare, public schools, and healthcare," he added. "This money has literally been burned, and not a single lira will go to Italian citizens, particularly those in Lombardy, so these are bogus Olympics."
Other demonstrators held signs reading "ICE Out" to protest US Immigration and Customs Enforcement's presence in Italy to provide security support for American athletes and officials. The agency is at the center of the Trump administration's deadly crackdown on unauthorized immigrants and their defenders in the US. On Friday, hundreds of protesters also rallied against ICE in Milan.
The protests took place as US Vice President JD Vance was in Milan as head of his country's Olympic delegation. Vance was loudly booed at Friday's opening ceremony in San Siro stadium.
While Saturday's demonstration was mostly peaceful, a small breakaway group reportedly threw firecrackers and other objects at police, who responded with brutal force, firing a water cannon, deploying chemical agents, and beating protesters with batons. A young woman suffered a head injury and a young man's arm was broken, according to il Manifesto, which reported six arrests.
Further afield, railway infrastructure was reportedly sabotaged around Bologna in Emilia-Romagna and Pesaro in coastal Marche.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni—whose right-wing government was a common subject of protesters' ire—condemned the demonstration and voiced "solidarity... with the police, the city of Milan, and all those who will see their work undermined by these gangs of criminals."
More anti-Olympics protests were set to take place in Milan on Sunday.
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