Skateboarding debuted at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 and will still be on the program at Los Angeles in 2028, by which point it will have earned permanent status by appearing at three consecutive Games. Breaking debuted at the Paris Olympics in 2024 and will not be at Los Angeles at all. Both decisions ran through the exact same International Olympic Committee process. The difference in outcome says less about which sport is more legitimate and more about who actually gets to choose, and when.
That distinction, between the IOC's formal criteria and the much more flexible host-city process layered on top of it, explains almost every surprising addition or removal to the Olympic program over the past decade.
