Break It Down!: Colorado Supremes Declare Presidential Ballot A No Trump Zone: SCOTUS to Decide

It's time to Break It Down!

In a stunning development, the Colorado Supreme Court removed Donald Trump from the state’s 2024 Presidential Ballot, ruling that he isn’t an eligible presidential candidate because of the 14^th Amendment “insurrectionist ban.”

In a previous ruling on November 17^th, a Colorado lower court had ordered the state’s top elections official to place Trump on the 2024 primary ballot, rejecting a lawsuit from a group of voters who argued the Republican frontrunner is constitutionally ineligible to hold office under a Civil War-era insurrection clause.

Judge Sarah B. Wallace of the Denver District Court ordered Trump be included on the ballot, even though she rejected Trump attorney’s claims that Trump’s messages to his supporters, including incendiary social media posts and a speech at the White House Ellipse preceding the violence at the Capitol, were protected speech under the First Amendment. Wallace wrote:

“The Court concludes … that Trump incited an insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, and therefore ‘engaged’ in insurrection within the meaning of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.”

Still, Wallace ultimate sided with a legal theory, put forward by several conservative scholars arguing that the provisions of the insurrection clause does not include the presidency. She wrote:

“After considering the arguments on both sides, the Court is persuaded that ‘officers of the United States’ did not include the President of the United States,” Wallace wrote. “It appears to the Court that for whatever reason the drafters of Section 3 did not intend to include a person who had only taken the Presidential Oath.”

Similar suits have also been rejected in Minnesota, and in Michigan, where the matter is currently under appeal. Yesterday’s Colorado Supreme Court ruling is the first to actually bar Trump from a state’s Presidential Ballot in 2024. The ruling disagreed with the assertion that the ban did not apply to the President. And, since it agreed that he had incited an insurrection, a majority of the Court concluded Trump should be excluded from the 2024 Ballot, ruling him ineligible due to the provisions of the 14^th Amendment Insurrection Ban.

The ruling is being placed on hold until January 4, in order to facilitate an appeal by Trump’s legal team to the U.S. Supreme Court. Read the 4-3 decision .

The Trump campaign said it would swiftly appeal, and described the ruling as “a completely flawed decision.” Trump has denied wrongdoing regarding the events of January 6^th. He has decried the 14^th Amendment lawsuits as an abuse of the legal process.

The state Supreme Court decision only applies to Colorado, but the historic ruling will almost certainly roil the 2024 presidential campaign. At least until SCOTUS decides whether it will hear the case (of course it will), and subsequently issue a ruling.

Colorado’s secretary of state, Jenna Griswold, vowed to follow the state Supreme Court’s ruling disqualifying former President Donald Trump from Colorado’s ballot. She disagreed with the dissenting justices’ rulings that the court erred in its decision. She told CNN’s Pamela Brown on “AC360:”

“My job as secretary of state is to make sure that only qualified candidates appear on our ballot.”

Not surprisingly, virtually the entirety of GOPWorld roundly condemned the decision.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) railed against the decision, calling it “nothing but a thinly veiled partisan attack.”

Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for Trump’s campaign, vowed the Trump campaign would appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority and includes three justices nominated by Trump.

House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (N.Y.) similarly dug into the justices, writing in a statement, “Four partisan Democrat operatives on the Colorado Supreme Court think they get to decide for all Coloradans and Americans the next presidential election.”

Without calling out Democrats directly, Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) said “they will do everything they can to block Donald Trump from being president again.”

Calling the ruling “extreme judicial activism,” Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert (R) said the ruling was designed to suppress the votes and voices of Colorado residents.

Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas) called the justices behind the decision a “disgrace to our country,” and echoed the ruling is “just more election interference.”

Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz (R), who publicly endorsed the former president earlier this year, said Democrats are “trying to imprison the party’s chief political opponent.”

Conservative Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.) echoed her Republican colleagues’ comments, arguing the decision “stole the election” away from Colorado voters and “robbed” them of their right to vote for Trump.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) weighed in on the decision, suggesting the Colorado Supreme Court violated an interest of the U.S.

Kari Lake, who is currently seeking one of Arizona’s seats in the Senate, said the decision overturns “over a century of judicial precedent.”

Even Texas Rep. Chip Roy (R), who came under attack by Trump on Monday, expressed his opposition to the ruling. In a repost of Sen. Mike Lee’s (R-Utah) post that read, “This lawless, cynical ruling by the Colorado Supreme Court will not stand,” Roy wrote, “Agree.”

With that, it’s clear, the wagons have been circled. Even a guy skewered by Trump Monday, took his side Tuesday. Trump went after Roy, who has long backed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s Republican presidential nomination, calling for someone to primary Roy, though the election filing deadline already passed.

Finally, Republican Sen.Thom Tillis said he plans to introduce legislation to prevent states from disqualifying presidential candidates from the ballot “on Constitutional matters that should be decided by only the Supreme Court.”

The reality, as it relates to Tillis’ gambit…it is unlikely that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, will have the Senate take up the legislation.

Lest anyone get too excited, or distressed, by this action, just remember, SCOTUS is 6-3 conservative, including 3 Trump appointees. It is very likely this decision will be overruled. Still, I am heartened by the fact that after courts in several states, including North Carolina, rejected bids to remove Trump, one followed its convictions, and ruled without fear or favor, that no man is above the law. Kudos Colorado. “Colorado Supremes Declare Presidential Ballot A No Trump Zone: SCOTUS to Decide!”

I’m done; holla back!

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