Question: why did carter boycott the 1980 olympics in moscow

title: 1980 Summer Olympics boycott
text: Western governments first considered the idea of boycotting the Moscow Olympics in response to the situation in Afghanistan at the 20 December 1979 meeting of NATO representatives , a fortnight after the invasion of Afghanistan . The idea was not completely new : since 1975 / 1976 proposals for an Olympic boycott circulated widely among human rights activists and groups as a sanction for Soviet violations of human rights . At that moment , not many of the member governments were interested in the proposal . The idea began to gain popularity in early January 1980 when Russian dissident Andrei Sakharov called for a boycott . On 14 January 1980 , the Carter Administration joined Sakharov 's appeal and set a deadline by which the Soviet Union must pull out of Afghanistan or face the consequences , including an international boycott of the games . On 26 January 1980 , Canadian Prime Minister Joe Clark announced that Canada , like the US , would boycott the Olympic Games if Soviet forces did not leave Afghanistan by 20 February 1980 . 

Answer: answer: Western governments first considered the idea of boycotting the Moscow Olympics after the invasion of Afghanistan. On 14 January 1980, the Carter Administration set a deadline by which the Soviet Union must pull out of Afghanistan or face the consequences, including an international boycott of the games.