• San Siro's 61,000-person crowd cheered when U.S. athletes entered the parade of nations but erupted in boos when JD Vance appeared on the big screen
  • The IOC president had urged spectators to "be respectful" just days earlier, after weeks of Italian protests over ICE agents providing security at the Games
  • Team GB freestyle skier Gus Kenworthy posted a photo of an expletive-laden anti-ICE message written in urine in the snow — and faced no Olympic sanction

MILAN, ITALY (TDR) — Vice President JD Vance was booed at the 2026 Winter Olympics opening ceremony Friday night when his image appeared on the video board at Milan's San Siro Stadium — a moment that encapsulated weeks of tension between the United States and its European allies over immigration enforcement, foreign policy and the role of federal agents abroad.

The boos were audible on international broadcasts. Canada's CBC feed captured the crowd reaction clearly, with an announcer narrating: "There's the Vice President, JD Vance … oop … those are not … eh, those are a lot of boos for him — whistling, jeering, some applause." NBC's U.S. broadcast was more muted, with commentators moving quickly past Vance's brief appearance on screen.

The contrast was notable: Team USA's 232 athletes drew raucous applause as flag bearers speed skater Erin Jackson and bobsledder Frank Del Duca led the delegation through the stadium. But when cameras panned to Vance and second lady Usha Vance waving American flags from a VIP box, the stadium's tone shifted noticeably.

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What Drove the Reaction

The jeers did not materialize out of nowhere. They arrived at the end of weeks of Italian backlash against the presence of ICE agents providing security for the American delegation at the Games.

The Department of Homeland Security confirmed that ICE's Homeland Security Investigations unit would support the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service during the Feb. 6-22 Olympics — a role U.S. officials say is standard at international events. But the deployment landed at a volatile moment. The fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis — Renee Good on Jan. 7 and Alex Pretti on Jan. 24 — had generated international coverage and turned ICE into a lightning rod.

Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala set the tone weeks before the ceremony, describing ICE in a radio interview as something Italians recognized from their own history:

"This is a militia that kills, a militia that enters into the homes of people, signing their own permission slips. It is clear they are not welcome in Milan, without a doubt."

Hundreds of protesters gathered in Milan's Piazza XXV Aprile on multiple occasions before the Games, with demonstrators holding signs reading "No ICE" beneath the Olympic logo. On Friday, hundreds more students rallied at the Politecnico di Milano university before the ceremony. An 18-year-old protester named Bruna Scanziani told NPR she had been horrified by videos of ICE operations in Minneapolis.

"All the videos are public and everyone can see what's happening. The perception of America has changed."

The IOC's Failed Plea

International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry had anticipated the problem. At a press conference Wednesday, when asked directly whether she expected Americans to be jeered, she issued what amounted to a public appeal:

"I hope that the opening ceremony is seen by everyone as an opportunity to be respectful of each other. When we went to the Olympic village, that is the best reminder of how we should be. No one is asking what country they come from or what religion. They are all just hanging out."

The crowd did not comply. And Vance was not the only target: Israel's four-athlete delegation also drew boos in the parade of nations amid ongoing calls to ban Israel from the Games over the war in Gaza. The loudest applause of the evening was reserved for Ukraine's 46-athlete delegation, a symbolic response that underscored the crowd's political awareness.

Kenworthy's Yellow Snow Protest

The stadium boos were not the only anti-ICE statement to emerge from the Games.

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Gus Kenworthy, a 34-year-old freestyle skier competing for Team GB at his fourth Olympics, posted a photo to his 1.2 million Instagram followers on Thursday showing the words "F--- ICE" written in yellow in the snow between his skis. He confirmed in a follow-up post that the message was written in urine.

In his caption, Kenworthy urged followers to contact their senators ahead of the Feb. 13 DHS funding deadline:

"Innocent people have been murdered, and enough is enough. We can't wait around while ICE continues to operate with unchecked power in our communities."

He provided a script for callers and specifically called for "getting ICE and CBP out of our communities, ending blank check funding for brutality, and establishing clear limits on warrantless arrests, profiling, and enforcement at sensitive locations like schools and hospitals."

Kenworthy's background makes his protest particularly layered. Born in Chelmsford, England, he moved to Telluride, Colorado at age two and represented the United States at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, where he won a silver medal in slopestyle. He switched allegiance to Team GB in 2019, came out of retirement to qualify for Milan-Cortina, and now competes in the half-pipe event. He is also an actor, known for roles in "American Horror Story," and was one of the first action-sports stars to publicly come out as gay in 2015.

The IOC confirmed Friday that Kenworthy would face no sanction. A spokesperson told the Press Association: "During the Olympic Games, all participants have the opportunity to express their views as per the athlete expression guidelines. The IOC does not regulate personal social media posts." The British Olympic Association was similarly unbothered, noting the post made no mention of Team GB and was published before Kenworthy entered the Olympic environment.

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Critics called the stunt attention-seeking. OutKick questioned Kenworthy's characterization of ICE operations, noting that the agency has documented arrests of convicted murderers, sex offenders and violent criminals under Operation Metro Surge.

The Diplomatic Split Screen

While protesters marched and crowds booed, Vance spent his Friday on a parallel diplomatic track. He started the morning at the Milano Ice Skating Arena watching team figure skating with his family and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. He then met with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni at the Prefettura di Milano for an hour-long bilateral meeting followed by a closed-door lunch.

The optics of the meeting were warm. Meloni, one of the European leaders closest to President Trump, described the Olympics as "events that tell about values that keep together Italy and the U.S., Europe and the U.S., Western civilization." Vance praised Italy's organization and spoke of "coming together around shared values."

But even Meloni's alignment with Washington has its limits. The Italian prime minister recently sided with European allies in opposing Trump's push to take control of Greenland, and the AP noted that U.S. relations with Europe have become "increasingly strained" under an administration that "has shaken up the rules-based order that has been at the center of U.S. foreign policy since World War II."

The split screen told the story: inside the palace, Vance and Meloni exchanged pleasantries about shared civilization. Outside, hundreds of students chanted against the country he represents. At San Siro that evening, the same crowd that roared for Ukraine's athletes booed America's vice president.

A Broader Pattern

This is not Vance's first experience with European jeers. He was booed at the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington last year, and the Milan reception follows a pattern of declining favorability for the Trump administration abroad — driven by tariff threats, military action in Venezuela, territorial ambitions toward Greenland, and now the ICE controversy that followed the American delegation across the Atlantic.

Vance himself struck a different tone when addressing U.S. athletes before the ceremony:

"The whole country — Democrat, Republican, Independent — we're all rooting for you, we're all cheering for you." The crowd at San Siro appeared to agree, at least when it came to the athletes. The distinction they drew — cheering the competitors, jeering the politician — was precise enough to suggest it was not anti-American sentiment, but a targeted political statement.

When a crowd of 61,000 cheers American athletes and boos America's vice president at the same event, is that a distinction the administration should take as reassurance — or as a warning about how far its international standing has fallen?

Sources

This report was compiled using information from Sports Illustrated's coverage of the Vance booing, France24's reporting on the ceremony and Vance-Meloni meeting, CBS News reporting on the Milan mayor's ICE comments, NPR's coverage of Milan protests, NBC News Olympics live updates, Yahoo News/EW reporting on broadcast reactions, The Daily Beast's coverage of Kenworthy's protest, GB News reporting on IOC's no-sanction decision, The Pink News profile of Kenworthy's ICE message, AP/ABC News reporting on the Vance-Meloni bilateral meeting, The Boston Globe's diplomatic context, LBC's on-the-ground ceremony reporting, and Newsweek's coverage of Italian ICE protests.

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