Freestyle skiers for Team USA at the Winter Olympics were slammed for criticizing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and for saying they don’t represent ICE operations while wearing the flag.
Several people took to social media to criticize Hunter Hess after he and Chris Lillis tried to distance themselves from the Trump administration and ICE. As Breitbart News reported, Hess in particular stated that just because he was “wearing the flag,” it didn’t mean that he represented “everything that’s going on in the U.S.”
“It brings up mixed emotions to represent the U.S. right now,” Hess said. “It’s a little hard. There’s obviously a lot going on that I’m not the biggest fan of, and I think a lot of people aren’t. If it aligns with my moral values, I feel like I’m representing it — just because I’m wearing the flag, doesn’t mean I represent everything that’s going on in the U.S.”
“If he doesn’t like the flag and what it represents, he is welcome to find another country,” one person wrote in a post on X. “We don’t care.”
“I’m thinking the Olympics TV ratings aren’t going to be phenomenal,” one person wrote.
“Privileged Gen Z from Oregon hasn’t traveled much,” Presidential Envoy for Special Missions Richard Grenell wrote in a post. “He’s representing the greatest country in the world…move to Canada if you aren’t proud of wear USA.”
“And this is one reason I don’t plan to watch the Olympics,” another person wrote in a post, adding that “the other reason is it is just mostly boring.”
