Anti-Doping Debate Reaches U.S. Congress

(ATR) The United States Congress held a debate on the world’s anti-doping framework in an attempt to hold sporting bodies accountable to reform.

The oversights and investigations subcommittee of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce heard testimony from five individuals about reforms needed for the world anti-doping framework. IOC medical director Richard Budgett, WADA director general Robert Koehler, United States Anti-Doping Agency chief executive Travis Tygart, and Olympians Michael Phelps and Adam Nelson gave statements before taking questions from the subcommittee’s members.

Committee chairman Representative Tim Murphy from Pennsylvania told Around the Rings after the hearing he believed that the testimony served its purpose to "facilitate and shine a bright light" on the current system and actors. The committee said during its conclusion it "hoped another hearing" would be scheduled in the future.

Murphy said that the hearing would most likely not change the level at which the U.S. funds both WADA and USADA, but will continue to question both WADA and the IOC. Although, Murphy could not rule out funding changes if reforms are not taken as time goes on.

"I want us to be motivated for the right reasons and if it takes money then sure," Murphy said. "It is a matter of we have to see they have a commitment to doing it the right way.

"We hope that the message is heard by the higher-ups, and that this will be continued to be monitored."

During the hearing congressmen repeatedly questioned how reforms could take place on an institutional level, and pressed both Budgett and Koehler about the intentions to form an independent WADA. The questioning was much more lenient on Tygart, who was allowed to emphasize how he believed solutions could be found fairly quickly to the problem of the "fox [sporting bodies] guarding the henhouse [WADA]."

"While the IOC and WADA are working to deputize the fox and educate the fox and equip the fox with the appropriate resources to do the job, it is still the fox, and there are still conflicts of interest," Tygart said. "Athletes around the world are being let down by sports controlled interests."

Throughout their testimony Budgett and Koehler emphasized governance reform remains ongoing, and both representative bodies were in favor of an independent WADA. Budgett, after the meeting, told reporters that the IOC did not support removing sporting actors completely from the WADA framework, saying they should exist as a minority on the executive board. That would allow removing "any sort of conflict of interest, while maintaining a connection to sport," according to Budgett.

He said the hearing was a productive debate, and Budgett believed it would embolden U.S. support for anti-doping measures.

"Obviously with these sorts of things you’re frustrated you can’t say more," Budgett said to ATR. "Actually, when we talk with [USADA] and WADA, we’re on the same team so there is a little bit of false impression of what’s going on. I think there will be support and if anything there will [now] be more support."

Tygart said after testifying that there was "a lot of talk…but we want to see action" from both WADA and the IOC going forward. He reiterated his position of believing reforms "could be done tomorrow," completely removing any conflict of interest from sporting bodies.

"I don’t think sport wants to recognize the issue in the way that its being forced to recognize the issue," Tygart told reporters. "I think candidly we saw a letter from the IOC on Friday talking about some new issues that were incorporated into the testimony. So I think this hearing forced them to start taking positions so they didn’t show up here unaccountable."

The letter Tygart is referring to was sent by IOC Director General Christophe De Kepper updating the current progress of both the Oswald and Schmid commissions investigating the findings from the second McLaren report. In the letter De Kepper says that "it will clearly take some time" for the commissions to report any findings given the scope and complexities of each commission’s mandate.

Representative Diana DeGette, from Colorado, emphasized the frustration Congress felt when reading the letter. She said the hearing reminded her of previous ones pertaining to the 2002 Salt Lake City scandal and the need to receive concrete answers from the IOC. She then questioned the IOC’s intention in the reform process given its seemingly "unending investigations" and belief the body was "looking at a number of angles dancing on the head of a pin."

Both Phelps and Nelson testified that athletes need to be included in any reform process, and that a baseline testing standard needs to be applied to every high performance athlete. Phelps detailed the invasive nature at which testing occurs for U.S. athletes, while Nelson shared his personal connection to the impacts of doping in the form of receiving his reallocated gold medal in the Atlanta airport food court.

Both athletes said they he did not believe that they ever competed at a truly clean international competition, emphasizing the need for reforms.

"We want to stand up on the block and know the other competitors prepared just like I did, and went through the exact same hard work that I did," Phelps said. "I hope to be able to see that one day."

Written and reported by Aaron Bauerin Washington.

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