Entry Visas, Ticket Prices Dominate IOC Progress Report on LA 2028 Games

The issues of entry visas and inflated ticket prices for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics dominated a progress report delivered by the American organisers to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on Tuesday.

Several IOC members, including International Equestrian Federation chief, Ingmar De Vos, raised the issue of entry visas for hundreds of thousands of athletes, their families, officials, media and fans to the U.S., asking LA Games organisers whether the process could be simplified.

Dagmawit Girmay Berhane, an IOC member from Ethiopia, said organisers should make sure that Olympic qualifying tournaments, held in the United States over the next two years, also allowed access to all eligible athletes.

“We have worked very closely with the (U.S.) State Department to design a visa system to allow athletes… to have access to a visa system designed especially for them,” Gene Sykes, chairman of the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee, said.

He added that there was ongoing close cooperation with U.S. authorities to make the process as easy as possible.

This is not the first time IOC members raised visa issues with the Games organisers, with the White House having already set up a task force to handle visas.

Last year, U.S. President Donald Trump banned citizens of several countries from travelling to the U.S.

Olympic Games can attract hundreds of thousands of visitors from across the world for the 16-day event, with more than 200 countries taking part and over 10,500 athletes competing.

Sykes said this year’s FIFA World Cup would act as a trial run for visas, albeit on a smaller scale, with only 48 nations taking part in that tournament.

“The FIFA World Cup will also be happening this summer so this entire process of welcoming visitors to the United States… is getting something of a trial run,” Sykes said.

IOC members also highlighted LA Games ticket prices, saying they were considerably more expensive than those for the Paris 2024 Olympics.

“When you privately pay for the Games, we have only two revenue streams: sponsorships and tickets. Our ticket prices on average are 17% higher than Paris,” LA Games chief Casey Wasserman told the IOC session.