NBC apologizes and deletes footage after misgendering trans athlete on Winter Olympics feed

NBC was forced to apologize after mistakenly referring to Swedish athlete Elis Lundholm with the wrong pronouns in its coverage of the Winter Olympics.

The 23-year-old skier, who was born female but identifies as male, was competing among the big boys even in the women’s freestyle at Milan-Cortina.

During Lundholm’s run, international Olympic coverage on NBC’s streaming platform Peacock referred to the athlete as “she” multiple times.

Commenting on Lundholm’s run, he said: ‘He goes off course here but… ah, he slides out of the gate.’ ‘He’ll stand up and walk around to make sure he doesn’t DNF as he continues to move down the line here.’

NBC quickly removed the footage from its platforms and social media channels, apologizing for the mistake.

“NBC Sports is taking this matter seriously,” NBC said. Outdoor Sports. ‘Today, we aired an international broadcast featuring non-NBCUniversal commentators who misgendered Olympian Elis Lundholm. We apologize to Elis and our viewers and have removed this replay.’

The skier, who was born a woman and identified herself as a man, was competing among the Mongolians

Lundholm’s participation is permitted under current International Olympic Committee (IOC) guidelines, making her the only openly transgender athlete competing at this year’s Games.

However, after making a mistake on the snowy tracks of Livigno, Lundholm took 29th place on Tuesday with a score of only 12.05.

However, the transgender Swede still had a chance to qualify for the final round on Wednesday morning due to the nuances of the qualifying world.

While the top 10 athletes on Tuesday automatically bid farewell, the remaining skiers will participate in the second round the next morning. The top 10 finishers will join the current finalists with a chance to win a medal on Wednesday afternoon.

However, this was not the case for Lundholm, who ranked 25th overall after the second qualifying round and missed the chance to compete for a medal.

Lundholm has previously talked about the comfort of competing in women’s-only divisions.

“I’ve always been treated well,” he previously told Swedish television channel SVT.

‘I came out and identified as male. But I compete with women because they have the same qualities as me. And that’s okay with everyone.’

Swede, a transgender man, becomes the first transgender competitor at the Winter Olympics

Her participation in the women’s team is in line with the IOC’s 2021 ‘Framework for Fairness, Participation and Non-Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity and Sex Differences’.

These rules allow transgender athletes to compete in the Olympics after being approved by their national sports federation.

Before hitting the tracks, Lundholm also addressed criticism about her participation.

‘Of course, that’s something I’ve been thinking about,’ he said. ‘You can hear the sounds outside. But then I do my job and I don’t care.’