LOS ANGELES — The Olympic flag arrived in Los Angeles on Monday, where it will fly in 2028, the next time the city hosts the Summer Olympics.
The flag arrived on a Delta jet carrying U.S. athletes and officials with “LA28” and a palm tree emblazoned on its side, and as the plane came to a halt, hip-hop legend Tupac Shakur’s “California Love” blared from speakers on the tarmac at Los Angeles International Airport.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass stepped off the plane wearing a red U.S. team tracksuit, beaming and waving an Olympic flag, before descending the airport steps to be greeted by California Governor Gavin Newsom. The mayor was accompanied by Olympic diver Delaney Schnell and skateboarder Tate Carew.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass waves the Olympic flag after arriving at Los Angeles International Airport on August 12, 2024. Etienne Laurent/AFP – Getty Images
At the airport, Mayor Bass said he felt “great pride and responsibility” to receive the Olympic flag in Paris on Sunday. He said Los Angeles is committed to putting on a great Olympics, but that American organizers now feel a “real need to step on the gas.”
In 2017, the International Olympic Committee awarded Los Angeles the rights to host the 2028 Olympics. It will be the third time that Los Angeles has hosted the modern Olympic Games, after 1932 and 1984.
Bass acknowledged that Paris had set a high bar to host the Olympics and said Los Angeles’ homelessness problem would be a challenge to overcome. But the City of Angels has one world-class asset that’s hard to come by: “We have Hollywood, so we’re hopeful that there will be a lot of magical opportunities,” Bass told Reuters in Paris.
Olympic officials in Paris handed the flag to their American counterparts at the closing ceremony on Sunday, and actor Tom Cruise brought some Hollywood glamour to Paris by rappelling from the roof of the French National Stadium to receive the flag.
As Cruise left the closing ceremony in Paris on a motorbike, the scene cut to pre-recorded footage of the 62-year-old Cruise skydiving into the Hollywood sign, with a wide shot showing the Olympic rings integrated into the Los Angeles landmark.
