‘She’s No Biles or Clark!’ Imane Khelif dares to do this just to surpass Caitlin Clark and Simone Biles in such a prestige race!
‘She’s No Biles or Clark!’ Imane Khelif Faces Criticism Over Controversial Votes in Coveted AP Award Race
The journalist Charly Arnolt appears to call those who voted for Imane Khelif in the AP Athlete of the Year award “lunatics” after the Algerian boxer won gold at the 2024 Olympic Games, to much controversy in Paris.
Khelif took gold in the welterweight category but faced serious accusations that she is actually male, despite being cleared to compete by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), based on previous ‘testing’ by the International Boxing Association (IBA).
The IOC later ripped into the IBA’s tests, describing them as “so flawed that it’s impossible to engage with it” before the IOC president, Thomas Bach, later tore into the inconsistencies between the stories of IBA authorities.
The 25-year-old from Ain Sidi Ali in the North African nation was then cleared to compete and in a story of true character to rise above the noise surrounding her, she took gold stopping China’s Yang Liu in the final.
As a result, she earned four votes in the AP Athlete of the Year voting and finished third behind the USA’s Caitlin Clark and Simone Biles with four votes, only for OutKick’s Charly Arnolt to appear to disagree with the decision.
“Places that are suspected to be a little bit more non-biased,” Arnolt told OutKick, as per EssentiallySports. “Like the AP [Associated Press].
“Which generally speaking just puts out straight facts. They usually don’t insert much opinion into their reporting. It’s more of just like, ‘Here are the facts’, and then other news organizations can run with those facts.
“But clearly here we have some lunatics in the mix. So AP is one more organization that you should add to your radar of maybe places not to get your sports information from if that’s what you’re looking for.”
Is Imane Khelif a woman?
The IBA, which had been disqualified by the IOC in 2019, claimed Khelif failed sex verification tests in their Women’s World Championship and disqualified her in 2023 despite allowing her to compete in the previous edition, where she was beaten in the quarterfinals.
Umar Kremlev, President of the IBA since 2020, then claimed she failed testosterone tests when he opposed her competing in the Olympic Games. However, this is where the inconsistencies begin as the Secretary General (Chris Roberts) said she underwent chromosome tests.
The IBA then went on to claim the World Anti-Doping Agency verified the tests they conducted, only for the WADA to then deny any involvement in sex verification and declared it only concerns itself with claims of doping.
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At the same time, Kremlev began to attack the IOC and Bach for their opening ceremony at the Olympics. The event included people in drag portraying a Christian story, which began marred by controversy too. Kremlev said he would take legal proceedings.
Khelif has since began legal action against those who claimed she was a man online on the grounds of cyber bullying, naming Elon Musk and J.K Rowling. She later began action against Le Correspondant in November after they published alleged, and unverified, medical reports about her.