Donald Trump. AP FILE PHOTO
US President-elect Donald Trump has offered his support to Los Angeles’s bid to host the 2024 Olympics, the mayor’s office said Thursday.
The Republican billionaire spoke by phone with Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and the two men had a “productive conversation,” Garcetti’s spokeswoman Connie Llanos said.
During the conversation Trump, who will succeed Democratic President Barack Obama on January 20, indicated his support for LA’s bid, she said.
Los Angeles hosted the Summer Olympics in 1932 and 1984, and is competing with Paris and Budapest to do the same for the 2024 games.
The name of the 2024 host city is set to be announced in September 2017 in the Peruvian capital of Lima.
Many Olympics-watchers had seen Trump’s election on November 8 as bad news for Los Angeles’s bid because of his controversial remarks on the campaign trail deemed racist, sexist and anti-Muslim.
In last August, when Trump’s chances of winning the White House looked slim, Garcetti warned that a victory by the outspoken populist would reduce the chances of Los Angeles being picked by the International Olympic Committee.