Donald Trump Jr. supports what critics call the “steroids Olympics.” This is a competitive sporting event that promotes the use of drugs that improve performance.
The enhanced game revealed on Thursday that Don Jr. venture company 1789 Capital will jointly lead a multi-million dollar investment round for the controversial group.
The funding round could raise double-digit millions of dollars for the project. He told the Financial Times. The exact numbers were unknown.
The goal of the game is to break major sports records by paying brilliantly for participation, while allowing athletes to dope with drugs that enhance almost all legally available performance.
“The enhanced game represents the future. The real competition, true freedom, and the actual records are being destroyed,” Trump Jr. said in a statement. “It's about excellence, innovation and American domination on the world stage. It's all about the Magazine movement.”
Trump Jr.'s partnership with the game that former President Biden denounced last year coincides with the controversial reforms of his father's government's drug and health policies.
On Thursday, the Senate confirmed Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a sceptic of a split vaccine, as President Trump's Secretary of Health and Human Services.
He campaigned with his father, but Trump Jr. doesn't have an official White House position.
The enhanced game has already found supporters of German billionaires Crypto Investor Balaji Srinivasan and Christian Angermayer who invest in biotech and psychedelics.
Peter Thiel, a venture capitalist billionaire and co-founder of PayPal and Palantir Technologies, is another investor with ties to the White House.
Thiel faced a controversy after funding the takedown of gossip news site Gawker and then funding wrestler Hulk Hogan's lawsuit against a media company over his leaked sex tapes.
The lawsuit was led by Australian businessman Aron D'Souza, now president of the Enhanced Games.
“Together with these big-power investors, we're building something innovative. In a sport that's not hypocrisy, the best can actually be the best,” D'Souza said in a statement. I've said that.
The game will be partially funded by advertisements from pharmaceutical companies, D'Souza told FT.
The enhanced game has yet to announce the city or date of the first competition, such as athletics, swimming, and “strength” events.
The group aims to host their first game in late 2025 or early 2026, according to its website.
One athlete, retired from Australian Olympic swimmer James Magnussen, signed up for the game after the group offered to pay him $1.5 million if he could crush the 50-meter freestyle record.
“If I spend $1 million on 50 Freestyle World Record, I'll be their first athlete.” He told the sports podcast Early this year.
“I'll juice the gills and break it in six months,” he added.
The World Anti-Doping Association and the International Olympic Committee are opposed to the games and call them irresponsible.
The website says that “safer sports” is one of its main priorities for enhanced games, and it promises to manage medical screenings for athletes ahead of sporting events.
