Budapest Adds Lineup of Ambassadors to Support Bid -- 2024 Roundup

(ATR) The Hungarian bid for the 2024 Olympics creates a team of diplomats to increase public support for the project.

The line-up of nine ambassadors will be charged with telling the story of the Budapest bid and will work closely with the bid’s leaders and athletes’ commission to spread awareness of the Games to the Hungarian public.

The diverse group of ambassadors includes celebrities, philosophers, economists, journalists and entertainment professionals.

"Our city is a strong contender with a master plan that turns Budapest into one, giant festival live site for Olympic sport," said Budapest 2024 chairman Balazs Furjes. "Our Ambassadors will help us to tell Budapest’s captivating story to the nation and to the world, inviting all of Hungary to join in."

The nine ambassadors are: János Csák, Tamás Fellegi, György Habsburg, János Martonyi, Christopher Mattheisen, Andrea Rost, Attila Szalay-Berzeviczy, Fruzsina Szép and Sándor Zwack.

Paris 2024 Partners with the Yunus Center

Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus opened an extension of the Yunus Centre in Paris Tuesday as a global resource for social business.

Yunus calls Paris a global leader in social economy and says he is confident the new center will help more social business initiatives develop.

"Involvement of Paris in social business will give out strong message that we can use our creative capacity to bring poverty, unemployment, and net carbon emission to zero," Yunus said in a statement.

The center has partnered with the Paris 2024 Olympic bid to deliver a number of initiatives including a joint social business program between the French Olympic Committee and French Olympians Association, the creation of a social charter for the bid and the commitment to support young people with 250,000 jobs that a Paris 2024 Olympics could potentially create.

"We are delighted to sign this partnership agreement with the City of Paris and the Yunus Centre to take action in the field of social innovation and the sustainable development of cities," said Paris 2024 chief executive Etienne Thobois.

"Sport and the organization of sports events has a unique power to promote peace and social and economic inclusiveness and by setting out clear objectives in this area we are committed to creating a genuine legacy with real benefits for the people of Paris and France."

Los Angeles 2024 Awaits U.S. Presidential Results

The next leader of the United States should be revealed late Tuesday evening as the contentious campaign between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton concludes.

The outcome of the election could have an impact on the Los Angeles bid for the 2024 Summer Games. While the bid currently has the support of President Barack Obama, there are still questions that remain about the next administration.

Olympic watchers say Hillary Clinton will be better than Donald Trump for the U.S. Olympic bid.

The president elected today will be asked to boost the Los Angeles Olympic bid as one of his or her first diplomatic initiatives. The IOC vote for the 2024 host city is Sep. 13, eight months after either Trump or Clinton takes office.

To be certain, the L.A. bid is not even a blip on the radar of the presidential candidates. Though it is understood that either Clinton or Trump will support the Los Angeles bid, neither candidate has made that declaration nor said much if anything about the Olympics during the campaign.

While LA 2024 is officially neutral for the election, the ties to the Clintons are closefor bid chair Casey Wasserman. In October he hosted a fundraiser for Hillary Clinton at his Beverly Hills home. The Wasserman Foundation he heads has donated millions to the Clinton Global Initiative and Wasserman has spoken at CGI events. Wasserman has called Bill Clinton his mentor on philanthropy, the two of them pictured together in a 2013 cover story in the Hollywood Reporter. For Wasserman, his charitable and political activities carry on in the style of his late grandfather Lew Wasserman, a legendary Hollywood executive.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, one of the country’s prominent Democrats, is also a strong link to the Clinton campaign. A Clinton victory presumably would give Garcetti the ability to tap into the White House to enlist support for the L.A. bid. Garcetti used his pull a year ago to convince Vice President Joe Biden to speak at the last-minute to the Association of National Olympic Committees assembly in Washington, D.C.

The LA bid has a statement of support from President Barack Obama and has been in touch with members of Congress to lay the groundwork for the federal assistance needed to stage the Games. And while Casey Wasserman may have great connections to the Clinton campaign, LA 2024 CEO Gene Sykes has had talks with Republican leaders such as Speaker of the House Paul Ryan to enlist congressional support.

Getting world sports leaders and IOC members to comment on the U.S. election ahead of the Nov. 8 vote is a difficult task. They say they do not want to be seen as trying to exert undue influence.

But for those who would comment, Hillary Clinton is their choice as a better U.S. president for the Los Angeles bid.

Gerhard Heiberg of Norway is the only IOC member ATR contacted who was willing to comment ahead of the vote, based on his experience from the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer where he led the organizing committee.

"We know Hillary. I met her at the Games in Lillehammer in 1994. She was very interested in the Games. Then we met her in Singapore in 2005 inconnection with the New York bid for 2012. Many of us feel that we know her and her interest in the Olympic Games," he says.

"Donald Trump is a different story, at least for the moment. I think he has scared a lot of us with the way he talks," says Heiberg.

"Conclusion, as of today, Hillary would be the right choice for Los Angeles 2024,"he says.

Click here for more opinions from the Olympic Movement on the Presidential election.

Written by Kevin Nutley and Ed Hula

Forgeneral comments or questions, click here.

25 Years at #1: Your best source of news about theOlympics is AroundTheRings.com, for subscribersonly.