Jimmy Carter’s Complicated Legacy With the Olympic Movement

Former American president Jimmy Carter died on Sunday at 100 years old, making him the first American president to live that long.

A one term president who served from 1977 through 1981, Carter was known in his office for a few big international diplomacy wins, efforts to promote renewable energy, land protection legislation, appointing more women and minorities to high-ranking federal positions than all of his predecessors combined, and reforming the U.S. civil service to attempt make the government more efficient.

Out of office, he was a tireless humanitarian, virtually singlehandedly putting the Habitats for Humanity home program on the map and continuing to volunteer with the organization until 2019 when he was 95 years old.

But perhaps his most controversial policy decision came in the arena of sport, where most U.S presidents have relatively-little political burden. Carter was the president who was responsible for the U.S. boycott of the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow; four years later, the U.S.S.R and its allies returned the favor in Los Angeles.

Jimmy Carter Explains his decision to boycott the 1980 Olympics:

The boycott was taken as a stand against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 – an interesting time stamp in history as Russia is currently barred from much of the international sports world after its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

While the revisionist vox populi in the modern day is a near-unanimous detestation for the decision, at the time polls showed that a majority of Americans initially supported the boycott in the early months of 1980 (55-60%). It was viewed as a renewal of American moral leadership on the global stage and a stand against the U.S.S.R., albeit 15 years after the peak of cold war tensions.

But as time wore on and the initial outrage at the onset of war faded, as it usually does, Americans soured on the idea, viewing it as most modern commentators do: an unfair punishment to American athletes who were viewed as pawns in a political stage that they had nothing to do with.

By the time the Olympics arrived in the summer of 1980, American support fell below 50%, with much of the public questioning whether the boycott was fair or effective – themes that still ring true today. Congress was also fairly-split on the decision.

The boycott ultimately became a political liability for Carter during the 1980 presidential campaign, which he lost to Ronald Regan, and the USSR remained in Afghanistan until 1989.

Whether politics belong in sports is a matter of opinion, but whether politics are a part of sport is an inalienable ‘yes.’ They always have been, at every level, from summer league swim team elections to huge budgets handed to politically-appointed Ministers of Sport. The original Olympic Games in Olympia, Greece almost 3000 years ago were deeply intertwined with politics, and the Olympic Games of today both have their own politics and are linked arm-in-arm with broader geopolitical issues.

But for those athletes who would have gone to the 1980 Games, along with their friends, teammates, and coaches, the decision was deeply personal. They lost that moment, their moment, to do the thing that they were put on the earth to do. The chance to fulfill the end of decades of work. A story with its last chapter unwritten.

But put in Carter’s perspective is that two years prior, he also signed into law one of the most important policies in American Olympic history – the Ted Stevens Amateur Sports Act. It transformed ‘amateur sports’ in America, gave more control to sporting organizations like the NCAA, allowed the creation of organizations like USA Swimming, and created the pathway for the foundation of the USOPC (then the USOC) to further American Olympic interests abroad.

It is with little argument one of the most consequential pieces of legislation for sports in the history of the United States of America, alongside things like Title IX, the Curt Flood Act, and the Sports Broadcasting Act.

Two years earlier, Carter was told by the nation that advancement in the Olympic space was crucial to the American rivalry with the Soviet Union, which was as much a cultural rivalry as it was an economic and political one. The United States was 3rd in the medals table in the 1976 Olympic Games behind the Soviet Union and East Germany, and the American people did not want to be third behind the Soviet Union.

So perhaps, then, the saying that Carter “inserted politics where it didn’t belong” is not the correct take as written in the last 24 hours by people like USA Today columnist Nancy Armour. It’s not that politics didn’t belong in the sports (which again, is an opinion); nor that the Olympics just don’t matter in issues of politics; rather it’s that you can’t win the fight if you don’t step into the ring.

The calculation, then, should be on could Americans have won the fight if they had participated. Could the U.S. team have been bold enough to step up against the East German and Soviet teams, both shrouded by accusations of doping, and won?

That answer can be projected but never confirmed. What is undeniable, though, is that the absence of the American allowed the dominance of the country’s political rivals. The Soviet Union led the medals table with 80 gold and 195 total medals; East Germany was 2nd with 47 and 126. The rest of the table (which included 4th place Cuba) was miles behind.

It also gave the USSR the ammunition to place honor in the retaliatory boycott four years later while dodging the worst of the accusations of pettiness.

It was a complicated decision in a complicated time. I think, with the benefit of hindsight, I can get on board with those who feel it was the wrong decision. But at the same time, I can’t vilify Carter for it. I can respect the opinion of those who were more personally touched by the decision, because I would expect them to feel differently.

So for now, on the same day as we remember Carter for his long-held role as the American elder statesman and his work in human rights, I will also honor the 1980 U.S. Olympic swim team for their grace in the face of an unwilling sacrifice.

The 1980 U.S. Olympic Swim Team

That was never able to compete at the Moscow Games. Roster courtesy of USA Swimming’s official archives.

• Steven Barnicoat
• William Barrett
• Terri Baxter
• Craig Beardsley
• Paul Bergen
• Michael Bottom
• George Breen
• Michael Bruner
• Elisabeth Buese
• Linda Burton
• Richard Carey
• Kimberly Carlisle
• Tracy Caulkins
• Chris Cavanaugh
• Stephanie Elkins
• Jeffrey Float
• William Forrester Jr.
• Rowdy Gaines
• Donald Gambril
• Brian Goodell
• Matthew Gribble
• George Haines
• John Hencken
• Nancy Hogshead
• Robert Jackson
• Linda Jezek
• Elizabeth Kinkead
• Kris Kirchner
• Karin LaBerge
• David Larson
• Kimberly Linehan
• Marybeth Linzmeier
• Stephen Lundquist
• Mary Meagher
• Glenn Mills
• John Moffet
• Ronald Neugent
• William Paulus
• Mary Pennington
• Dennis Pursley
• Susan Rapp
• Randolph Reese
• Lillian Richardson
• Peter Rocca
• Brian Roney
• Mark Schubert
• John Simons Jr.
• David Sims
• Jill Sterkel
• Susan Thayer
• Richard Thornton
• Jesus Vassallo
• Susan Walsh
• Cynthia Woodhead