Jun 23, 2024; Harrison, New Jersey, USA; NJ/NY Gotham FC defender Tierna Davidson (15) reacts in the first half against the Washington Spirit at Red Bull Arena. | Lucas Boland-USA TODAY Sports

At the Tokyo Summer Olympics in 2021, there were four publicly out LGBTQ athletes on the U.S. Soccer Team. At the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup, the USWNT had three out players: O’Hara, Rapinoe and Kristie Mewis. At the 2019 World Cup, there were five out athletes and the head coach — Jill Ellis — was out. Other out legends like Abby Wambach have long since retired.

Yet at the 2024 Olympics in Paris, there is only one publicly out athlete Outsports can identify: Tierna Davidson. There is one out alternate for the team: goalkeeper Jane Campbell. When the United States takes on Zambia in the Group stage, Davidson will likely be the only publicly out player on the pitch. Zambia has some of the most anti-gay laws in the world, imprisoning people for homosexuality, including life sentences.

So what happened to a United States women’s team that seemed to be building a welcoming space for out gay, lesbian and bi women in the sport?

Related

US Soccer adds anti-LGBTQ Korbin Albert to the Paris Olympics roster

While it obviously isn’t a one-to-one dynamic, the addition of Korbin Albert to the roster for the Paris Olympics couldn’t have helped.

Albert had shared some posts on social media that were clearly anti-gay and transphobic in nature.

Davidson — again, the only publicly out athlete on the team that Outsports can clearly identify — spoke about the difficulty of having Albert on the team.

“I think that it’s difficult, because as a team we have always wanted to be very welcoming to all of our fans, to all players that walk through the locker room, and so to have that in our space is very difficult,” Davidson told Steph Yang of The Athletic.

Albert now plays professional soccer in France after a stint in college soccer with Notre Dame.

USWNT coach Emma Hayes says teammates shouldn’t date one another

Emma Hayes has been a manager in England for a while. Now over a decade after managing the Chicago Red Stars, she’s come back across the Atlantic to manage the USWNT. And she’s brought some tired long-forgotten tropes along with her.

Hayes said at one point that romantic relationships between teammates were “inappropriate.” After realizing how far society had gotten past this mentality from over a decade ago, she backtracked.

“I have to expect that I am supposed to be the most well-trained, non-clickbait headline coach, and I’ve let myself down,” she said, essentially doing a mea culpa for simply sharing out loud what she really thinks.

Still, the damage was done. Hayes does not think intra-team relationships are a good idea. And this is as the new manager of a team that has seen teammates Ali Krieger and Ashlyn Harris dating. The two married, had kids, but are now divorced.

Fewer out LGBTQ athletes on Team USA and around the Olympics world

This will likely be the first Summer Olympics where the number of out LGBTQ athletes at the Games — that Outsports can identify — decreases from the previous Games.

In Tokyo, we knew of 186 out athletes. Our list of out LGBTQ Olympians in Paris is currently substantially below that.

It includes a reduction of out athletes on team USA, as well as a reduction of out athletes in women’s soccer.

The “why” of that is interesting. While some countries like Brazil have more publicly out athletes than three years ago, others like the Netherlands, Canada and the United States have fewer.

So what’s the answer? There are multiple indicators as to why the USWNT has fewer out LGBTQ athletes than in recent years. That can include a shift in how athletes are showing up on social media, a change in culture, and even frankly Outsports’ ability to identify these out athletes.

While the team doesn’t need to recruit these athletes, we hope any gay, lesbian or bi athlete on the U.S. women’s soccer team feels free to be publicly out.