The Colorado Supreme Court is removing former President Donald Trump from the primary ballot, saying he is ineligible to be president.
In a stunning and unprecedented decision, the Colorado Supreme Court removed former President Donald Trump from the state’s 2024 ballot, ruling that he isn’t an eligible presidential candidate because of the 14th Amendment’s “insurrectionist ban.”
“Even when the siege on the Capitol was fully underway, he continued to support it by repeatedly demanding that Vice President (Mike) Pence refuse to perform his constitutional duty and by calling Senators to persuade them to stop the counting of electoral votes.
“President Trump’s direct and express efforts, over several months, exhorting his supporters to march to the Capitol to prevent what he falsely characterized as an alleged fraud on the people of this country were indisputably overt and voluntary.”
Ratified after the Civil War, the 14th Amendment says officials who take an oath to support the Constitution are banned from future office if they “engaged in insurrection.” But the wording is vague, it doesn’t explicitly mention the presidency, and has only been applied twice since 1919.
We have full confidence that the U.S. Supreme Court will quickly rule in our favor and finally put an end to these unAmerican lawsuits,” Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement.
Chief Justice Brian Boatright, one of the three dissenters on the seven-member court, wrote that he believes Colorado election law “was not enacted to decide whether a candidate engaged in insurrection,” and said he would have dismissed the challenge to Trump’s eligibility.
LINKS
AP: Colorado Supreme Court bans Trump from the state’s ballot under Constitution’s insurrection clause | @negativenull@startrek.website
Washington Post: Donald Trump is barred from Colorado’s 2024 primary ballot, the state Supreme Court rules | @silence7@slrpnk.net
CNBC: Colorado Supreme Court disqualifies Trump from 2024 ballot, pauses ruling to allow appeal | @return2ozma
NBC News: Colorado Supreme Court kicks Donald Trump off the state's 2024 ballot for violating the U.S. Constitution. | 18-24-61-B-17-17-4
CNN: Colorado Supreme Court removes Trump from 2024 ballot | A Phlaming Phoenix
CNN:Colorado Supreme Court removes Trump from 2024 ballot based on 14th Amendment’s ‘insurrectionist ban’ | @Boddhisatva
New York Times: Trump Is Disqualified From the 2024 Ballot, Colorado Supreme Court Rules | @silence7@slrpnk.net
https://archive.is/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/10/trump-eligible-president-abdul-hassan/675669/
Would be interesting to see Gorsuch reverse himself here.
That was a great read. Thank you for the link.
Tl;Dr?
Guyanese born guy wants to run for president. He can't because he's not a natural born citizen. So he said, "fine, but there's nothing saying the state can't keep me off the ballot if I'm ineligible" and Gorsuch handed down the ruling saying Colorado has the right to in fact keep him off the ballot which sets the president that Colorado is in the right keeping people off the primary ballot
Which, if I understand it correctly, doesn't require him to reverse himself. the question in that case doesn't appear to be whether he wasn't eligible to be POTUS, but whether they could keep him off the ballot because was ineligible. He ruled, yes if he is ineligible for POTUS, they can keep him off the ballot.
The easy out here is that he rules, like a previous judge ruled, that the amendment doesn't actually restrict one from being POTUS.
That’s what the second part of the articles covers, because that same case also hinged on the argument that the law also specifies that Colorado has the right to control access along these lines:
I read this as an argument as to why he could also rule that CO could remove him from the ballot, not that he has to rule that they can remove him from the ballot for consistency. They make it pretty clear at the start that there is a "thicket of questions."
Don't they usually have to explain why the lower court decision is incorrect? Colorado here said it's ridiculous that the 14th amendment wouldn't cover the presidency, so they'd need Olympic level gymnastics to explain why that's wrong.
There are actually two outs for them.
First, scotus has already ruled we don't elect officers of the US and thus they could argue that the amendment doesn't apply to him because it says it applies to people who have taken an oath as a member of Congress or as an officer of the US. Neither of which is true for him.
Second, the "why list out senator and even electors of the POTUS, but not the POTUS itself, if it was meant to be included" is a perfectly reasonable argument. Just as "of course it should be included under the 'any office' part of the amendment" is also perfectly reasonable.
Neither of these requires any mental gymnastics, let alone Olympic level.
Fair enough. They're very flimsy arguments, but they are simple ones.
I can see thinking the second is flimsy, but there is no catch all to fall back on for the first, so I don't see how it can be hand waved away so easily.
Another presidential candidate lost his court case against Colorado and the same ruling could apply to Trump that a state has the ability to prevent an unfit candidate from the ballot regardlessregardless of their standing outside that state... oh and the guy who ruled that against the other candidate (not trump) is now on the supreme court... via Trump's nomination.
Colorado previously used the 14th amendment to keep a candidate off the ballot. Ultimately they used the bit where "they have to maintain order and smooth operations of the voting and election process" (paraphrased). They are pointing out that Trump can easily be disqualified under the same reasoning.
The person who kept the other candidate off the ballot is now a lawyer for Trump.
I'm sober enough to grok it, but waaaaay too high to summarize it.
Are you me, spaceman?
I'm not prepared to rule that out at this juncture.
Relevant part: