Biden White House joins fight over Olympic doping ahead of 2034 Salt Lake City Games

The conflict between the United States and the world anti-doping body over how to handle positive test results from Chinese swimmers has intensified in recent weeks and has drawn a powerful new player into the mix: the Biden White House.

The regulatory body, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), informed the White House last month that its officials intended to bar an administration official from participating in any deliberations on the positive test results of Chinese athletes during a meeting of the agency’s leadership this week in Turkey.

The attempt to oust the official, Dr. Rahul Gupta, director of the Office of National Policy for Drug Control, is seen as part of a broader effort by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to counter U.S. criticism of the agency’s handling of doping allegations, as well as an attempt to shut down the FBI’s investigation into the matter.

WADA critics say the agency’s push to exclude Gupta from the discussions is intended to undermine the United States’ ability to raise concerns about the handling of Chinese testing ahead of the last two Summer Olympics, as well as to hamper calls for greater transparency and accountability in the global anti-doping system.

The White House has responded forcefully, according to documents reviewed by The New York Times and interviews with government and anti-doping officials. The heated exchange is expected to reach a climax Thursday at a meeting in Turkey.

“Any attempt to impose preliminary measures will be vigorously opposed and appropriately addressed by the United States government,” a top White House lawyer wrote to WADA in a previously undisclosed nine-page letter sent late last month and reviewed by the Times.

The revelations about Gupta come at a time when WADA continues to pressure the United States in other ways.

The anti-doping agency has refused to turn over documents in response to requests from congressional committees investigating the matter. In July, the International Olympic Committee, WADA’s largest sponsor, essentially made the 2034 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City contingent on promises from local officials that they would help curb investigations by the Justice Department, the FBI and Congress.

In August, WADA sued the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, its most vocal critic, in Switzerland, citing what it called “continued defamatory comments,” according to a WADA statement to its executive board.

Throughout, WADA has kept up a drumbeat of criticism of the U.S.’s handling of doping cases, repeatedly pointing out that most American professional sports operate outside the purview of the global anti-doping system. Internally, WADA has been conducting a leak investigation to determine who leaked the documents to the Times, which published an investigation in April that revealed how the agency handled positive tests involving about two dozen Chinese swimmers.

Gupta, the White House’s top drug official, is a member of WADA’s board, representing not only the U.S. but more than 40 countries in the Americas. Only the International Olympic Committee contributes more than the U.S. to WADA’s $40 million annual budget.

His potential exclusion from this year’s executive committee session in Turkey was discussed at a meeting last week with officials representing the world’s five regions on WADA’s board, according to two officials with direct knowledge of the talks but who were not authorized to discuss them publicly. At that meeting, representatives from other regions agreed to speak out against Gupta’s exclusion on Thursday.

The effort to remove Gupta, who was honored by WADA in a ceremony back in March, has been ongoing for several weeks and has been met with a strong response from the White House.

The White House said in a letter to WADA that the agency’s top brass orchestrated an effort to sideline Gupta through an anonymous conflict-of-interest complaint that accused him of attending meetings without disclosing his knowledge of the criminal investigation into China.

In response to questions from The Times, WADA spokesman James Fitzgerald said it was untrue that the agency planned to ban Gupta and that its top officials, president Witold Banka and long-time director general Olivier Niggli, had concluded the doctor had a conflict of interest.

At Thursday’s meeting, WADA executive committee members will receive a copy of the final report on the handling of China’s doping cases by an independent prosecutor hired by the agency. The prosecutor’s interim conclusions, released before this year’s Paris Olympics, cleared the agency of any wrongdoing.

The unrest between WADA, Olympic officials and the U.S. predates the current crisis and stems from the passage of legislation in 2020 that allows U.S. law enforcement to prosecute doping cases worldwide. It’s that power that worries global anti-doping officials the most, as they increasingly express concerns about the risk of “retaliatory retaliation” laws being passed in other countries.

In June, the head of swimming’s governing body was approached by federal investigators while attending the U.S. Olympic trials and subpoenaed for information related to the China case, an incident that has left some international sports officials wary of traveling to the U.S. for fear of being drawn into criminal cases.

This article was originally published in New York Times.