ESPN gave a U.S.-born athlete who competed for China in the Olympics the Best Breakthrough Athlete ESPY award on Wednesday.
Eileen Gu, who was born in San Francisco to a Chinese mother, represented China in the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing rather than her native United States. The young athlete won two gold medals for China in freestyle skating, according to ESPN.
EILEEN GU SHOULD NOT BE PART OF THE US BID FOR THE OLYMPICS
“I also want to share this moment with all the incredible pioneering female athletes who’ve come before me, who paved the way for people like me,” she said during her acceptance speech. “Also to the young girls who are going to come after me and who are going to be the change makers and who are going to push it one step further closer to equality.” She finished by thanking her mother and grandmother before a brief message in Mandarin.
In an Instagram post, Gu announced in 2019, at age 15, that she was choosing to represent China in the 2022 Winter Olympics.
“I am proud of my heritage, and equally proud of my American upbringings. The opportunity to help inspire millions of young people where my mom was born, during the 2022 Beijing Olympic Winter Games is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to help to promote the sport I love. Through skiing, I hope to unite people, promote common understanding, create communication, and forge friendships between nations,” she wrote.
Given that the International Olympic Committee holds that athletes must hold passports for the countries they represent and China doesn’t allow dual citizenship, Gu would have had to renounce her U.S. citizenship, as noted in an ESPN profile. She has refused to comment on whether or not she renounced her U.S. citizenship. She has also refused to comment on the Chinese government’s human rights record, even when asked directly.
In February 2019, she traveled to China to appear next to Chinese President Xi Jinping when he gave a speech urging Chinese athletes to win medals in order to contribute to “the nation’s great rejuvenation,” according to the Economist. Gu and her sponsors have never acknowledged this encounter. In October, she starred in a Chinese film that opened in Xinjiang province, near where the Chinese government is accused of detaining 1 million Uyghur Muslims in concentration camps.
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Despite her refusal to comment on political issues in China, Gu is highly vocal about social justice issues in the U.S., such as her support for the Black Lives Matter movement or speaking out against anti-Asian bigotry, according to the South China Morning Post.
