Senate Finance Committee Quizzes USOC -- Top Story Replay

(ATR) The chair of the Senate Finance Committee requests information from the United States Olympic Committee about how it is protecting athletes from abuse, an obligation it must meet to maintain tax-exempt status.

Senator Charles Grassley from Iowa sent a letter to Sarah Hirshland with a number of questions asking what the organization is doing in the wake of the Larry Nassar scandal to protect athletes. The full letter can be read here.

"The IRS is responsible for determining compliance with legal tax-exempt status requirements," Taylor Foy, a spokesperson for Senator Grassley, said to Around the Rings. "The purpose of the letter is to get a better understanding of what steps [the USOC] is taking to prevent future abuse and respond to the needs of current survivors."

Foy said that the committee is "looking to learn more about the points raised in the letter" before taking any next steps related to the USOC’s tax-exempt status.

"We welcome Senator Grassley’s interest in athlete safety and look forward to providing more information on our efforts," Patrick Sandusky, USOC spokesperson, said in a statement to ATR. "Congress has an important oversight role to play in Olympic and Paralympic sport and continued collaboration with our partners in government is crucial to serving healthy and successful athletes."

Grassley said he wrote the letter after consulting with survivors of Nassar’s abuse and wrote to Hirshland that "as a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation, the USOC is required to comply with its stated purpose in order to maintain its tax-exempt status".

Since taking over as USOC Chief Executive last year Hirshland began the process of revoking USA Gymnastics as the national governing body for the sport. Since then, USA Gymnastics has filed for bankruptcy while working to reform itself.

Congress has held numerous hearings pressing U.S. sport leaders about how they are working to protect athletes. In 2017 Congress authorized the creation of the U.S. Center for SafeSport to handle investigating cases of athlete abuse. The center is funded by the USOC, outside donations, and grants from the Department of Justice.

Currently, SafeSport has been in the headlines after recent arbitration hearings overturned bans for Jean and Steven Lopez and the suicide of figure skater John Coughlin, who was under investigation by the center. SafeSport had been criticized for its handling of the Lopez arbitration hearings, but told Think Progress in a statement it had "issued 365 final decisions, including making 262 individuals permanently ineligible; of those only 11 went to arbitration (arbitrators supported that there were violations in 8 of the 11 matters)".

Grassley’s letter asks if the USOC was working to increase the funding for SafeSport, and asked how it determined its funding levels for the organization.

Hirshland said in an interview with The New York Times earlier this month that she had asked for more money for SafeSport on every visit to Washington, but "we don’t have any confidence that real funding is going to come at this point".

The letter does not address ongoing civil litigation against the USOC from Nassar survivors, but Hirshland said in the interview that "I am confident, based on the information I have today, that [the USOC] will be able to resolve the litigation and be strong and healthy as we go forward".

Grassley’s letter also asks if the USOC has a "comprehensive list of all banned or suspended personnel," and to explain why, if so, such information was not available online. It also asked if the USOC was planning to institute protocols to inspect all U.S. Olympic training sites. It also asks if the USOC was planning on any other changes to the organization’s structure following the release of the Ropes & Gray report.

"Is the USOC actively investigating whether or not other individuals within USOC were made aware of the abuse allegations?" Grassley wrote. "Has the USOC instituted training for its board members and other personnel, including NGB personnel, on how to identify warning signs of sexual abuse?"

Written by Aaron Bauer

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