President Joe Biden is pushing to allow the Indigenous nation that invented lacrosse to play under its own flag when the sport returns to the Olympics in 2028.
Biden’s position, being announced Wednesday at the White House Tribal Nations Summit, is a request for the International Olympic Committee to allow the Haudenosaunee Nationals to compete as its own team at the Los Angeles Games.
That would require the IOC to make an exception to a rule that permits teams playing only as part of an official national Olympic committee to compete in the Olympics. The Haudenosaunee have competed as their own team at a number of international events since 1990.
“We’re hopeful the IOC will see it our way, as well,” Tom Perez, the White House senior adviser and director of intergovernmental affairs, told The Associated Press. “If we’re successful, it won’t simply be the flag of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy that marches in the Olympics, it will be the flag of Indigenous people across the world.”
The Haudenosaunee, formerly known as the Iroquois, is a collection of six Indigenous nations whose territory covers upstate New York and adjacent sections of Canada.
Shortly after the IOC announced in October that lacrosse was returning to the Olympics, it reiterated its stance about teams having to compete under the flag of an established Olympic committee. It suggested the U.S. and Canadian Olympic committees would have to find a way to include Indigenous athletes on their respective national teams.
Carving out certain spots for the athletes on U.S. and Canadian teams would create logistical problems of its own in the selection process. It wasn’t the ultimate goal of Haudenosaunee leaders when they pushed for lacrosse to come back to the Olympics.
“The ultimate goal is for the Haudenosaunee to win a gold medal,” said Leo Nolan, the executive director of the Haudenosaunee Nationals. “It’s a delicate situation because there are so many moving parts to this whole thing.”
But, he…
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