Friday USA Swimming Sex Abuse Roundup

by Irvin Muchnick and Tim Joyce

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Deja Vu All Again Over: USA Swimming Reconsiders Coach-Athlete Sex Prohibition

With the threat of a Congressional investigation hovering over it, swimming’s annual Aquatic Sports Conference is taking place in Garden Grove, California. As on previous occasions, there’s a proposal for new legislation, reported out by the Rules Committee, to restrict coach-athlete sexual relationships. But this year the packet on legislative proposals that was distributed to delegates appears to up the ante by asserting that the reform has been mandated by the United States Olympic Committee so as to bring USA Swimming into comformance with all of USOC’s national sport governing bodies.

The literature in support of the new rule describes it as an initiative to “Comply with Minimum Standards for Safe Sport mandated by the USOC.”

Here’s how we covered last year’s convention consideration of a similar proposal (which would be soundly shot down in the plenary vote): https://concussioninc.net/?p=6018. Let’s see what emerges this year.

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USA Swimming Says Membership Climbs Over 400,000

In a press release, USA Swimming claims membership has surpassed 400,000 for the first time. It is not surprising that swimming got a post-Olympics bump, and it is not surprising generally that club swimming is extremely popular. The more kids involved, the more kids are exposed to this organization’s deep-seated culture of sexual abuse, cover-up, and retaliation. These are arguments for Congressman George Miller and his staff to continue full-speed.

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Seven Days: The Last Week’s Headlines

USA Swimming’s Multimillion-Dollar International Sex Abuse Insurance Scam (Introduction)