https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/colorado-supreme-court-kicks-trump-states-2024-ballot-violating-us-con-rcna130484
The ruling marks the first time a 14th Amendment challenge to Trump's candidacy has been successful.
So which will SCOTUS rule:
A. January 6 wasn't really an insurrection;
B. Trump didn't participate;
C. The 14th Amendment doesn't really mean what the plain words of it say it means
?
My bet is C
SCOTUS refused to entertain Trump's election lie. Don't be so certain they will be friendly to him this time. I hate the current SCOTUS, but they can surprise you sometimes.
It's also not like he can retaliate in any way (other than trying to provoke his supporters into acting). They are set up for life, and can continue to influence the country for years to come with or without him. They may choose to let him drown.
Exactly. They are in no way beholden to him. And even their pet issue of abortion has been taken care of, so they've paid their dues. Now they can do whatever they feel like.
Sure he can, why don't you think he can?
He's been shown to indirectly threaten judges, juror, investigators, and witnesses. By turning the hate and violence of his supporters their way. He doesn't have to personally do anything, there will always be a sympathizer willing to lay down their own life and well-being for his political cause, that's how fascism works.
He very much can retaliate. And has a rich history of it at this point.
Another way that retaliations can be had is with a corrupt Supreme Court who are influenced by external parties by way of wealth or influence. In which case sources of wealth can be pulled or affected.
Good thing we don't have any Supreme Court members on dubious grounds related to ill-gotten gains...
Thomas almost feels like he has an obligation to something other than his wallet, so he's slowed down on the radically unpopular rulings.
The only certainty is that Roberts and the liberal judges would definitely not be onboard with ignoring the 14th. Kavanagh probably, Thomas all but certainly.
We can definitely hope. But it's really going to come down to how well the individuals are owned.
If this were just a panel of supreme Court justices voting along their biases, It's anybody's guess what they could do. But they're not exactly impartial and lots of people have lots of dirt against them then gobs and gobs of political power.
or D, an obscure quote from the Old Testament about the power of Kings and their scepters and orbs and whatnot
Disqualifiers you mean... But it's still debatable... Especially since, as previously said, states are in charge of how they run elections.
They will probably pass it back to the states. It's not like the blue states were going to vote for Trump anyways, and the "unfairness" of it will probably boost him in purple and red states.
They will probably pass it back to the states
If you want chaos, this would be the best bet.
It’s extremely risky for him. It looks like this was brought by citizens. Citizens in purple states could also bring it and get the same result. Some might say yes, some say no, but if enough say no name on ballot, he has no path to victory.
Would the republicans implode, choose among the trash candidates they currently have in the debates, or would someone new step up?
Unlike other republicans who are at the whim of trump, the Supreme Court can’t really be touched and don’t have to bow down to him while still being shitty republicans.
The Supreme Court doesn't really have any say in how states run their elections. That's the only wrinkle I see on this. If they tried to dictate state elections, states could just ignore it.
The question is if Trump qualifies to be president per the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. The states don't decide that, SCOTUS does.
The constitution is pretty clearly written on this one. Any decision otherwise than to bar Trump from running is playing fuckery politics.
The 14th amendment also guarantees the right to seek medical treatment. Yet women are denied this right.
The 14th amendment does not guarantee any sort of right to any specific healthcare.
If it did, one assumes abortion proponents would have used that language in lieu of privacy as in Roe v Wade
It's not the right to healthcare. It's the right to seek healthcare. Ie, they can't deprive you of life or liberty without charging you. Restricting you from seeking healthcare deprives you of both.
They used whichever they thought was more likely to get through SCOTUS.
Restricting you from seeking healthcare deprives you of both.
This does not stand up to constitutional muster, is my point. The argument is that the government has a right to prevent certain things that could be healthcare, and that does hold water constitutionally.
Like, I love your energy here but this is not the way to guarantee abortion/reproductive care access
Going with C. Without explicit language to the president, they will need to interpret this to mean the president included, which may be up to anyone’s interpretation.
I feel it should, however it could be argued it doesn’t.
who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof
It cannot be argued in good faith. Talking about the presidency as an office has been a thing forever, and therefore the president is an officer. He's also an officer just by the plain meaning of the word officer. I never heard one peep to the contrary until people started looking for a way for Trump to weasel his way out of the 14th amendment.
It’s all up to interpretation though, you might not see it, or you might have heard it in a way, but it can be argued. Similar to the lower court judge saying so.
Similarly one of the judge points out in the dissenting opinion there is no conviction of insurrection.
So I still think C will win, but A or B is a possibility too.
"In the absence of an insurrection-related conviction, I would hold that a request to disqualify a candidate under Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment is not a proper cause of action under Colorado’s election code. Therefore, I would dismiss the claim at issue here”
I see it just fine. I reject it as a bad faith argument. Any judge who entertains it is showing how corrupt they are.
Pointing to a lack of a conviction, OTOH, is at least a reasonable argument not based on pretending not to understand what words mean.
Yea fair enough. Just a different set of eyes is all. Thanks for the response!
The lack of conviction is prolly the biggest hurdle here which makes me wonder who would, or even could, bring those charges (even if the lower court explicitly stated he did). Jack smith has his hands full and while interesting to follow it’s not a direct case of questioning insurrection. Curious as to where it all leads.
End of the day, it starts to ask the question, which prolly ends at the Supreme Court no matter what.
Trump wss just committed to the continuity of government at all costs. Including the republic itself.
(That is the likely argument)
Good, this shouldn't even have been a debate. It is clear that Trump attempted a coordinated effort to stay in office. If that's not disqualifying from president, then nothing is.
As much as I'd love to see other states follow, I don't see how this would be relevant in any other state. It's a state supreme court ruling on a issue within their own state. Any other state trying to claim precedence would be really strange
It's a constitutional amendment that was ruled on. The Constitution applies the same in all states. If it were just Colorado law I think it would be much harder to appeal the ruling to the US Supreme Court.
It's been reaffirmed many, many times that states are allowed to do essentially whatever they please when it comes to how they run their own election, outside of discriminating against protected classes. Even if it were to get shot down, they could pass a law simply disallowing their electors from voting for Trump.
Laws targeting one individual are explicitly unconstitutional. In a scenario where SCOTUS overturns Colorado (which is unlikely) they couldn't just get around that by passing a law that says "Trump can't run".
Article I, Section 9, Clause 3:
No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.
More context here:
https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/article-1/section-9/clause-3/bills-of-attainder
In fact, let's try this from another angle altogether: if it were legal for a state to bar an individual (or entire political party, since that's not a protected class!), then how long would it be before Florida or Texas passed a law that outlawed Biden/Democrats from entering elections in the state? If that were legal, the entire system would collapse into chaos, even more than it is already.
Again, this assumes SCOTUS overturns CO. That seems unlikely, so it's probably a moot point, but in that scenario, there is no end-run around the ruling.
The supreme court case that follows is what they are referring to and that CAN affect other states
Except that's my point. SCOTUS has held that up every step of the way. Even with how absolutely fucked the current court is, I honestly doubt they're going to decide to throw state's rights to control their elections out the window, considering they'd effectively be signing the electoral college's death warrant
There are two issues here. I don't think the Supreme Court can't decide if he goes on the ballot, but they can decide if he's eligible to become president.
States can put Trump on the ballot and send electors for him, but if the Supreme Court rules that he's ineligible, he can no more become president than if he were a child or a foreign national.
(Caveat: IANAL)
Note that this applies to the primary also, so it might damage him by encouraging his Republican challengers to stay in the race.
This is a massively historical moment. But, with everything that has happened the last several years this is, quite literally, Tuesday for me.
Current SCotUS is hella corrupt, but I don't see them denying that the individual States control their own elections.
We also just reintroduced wolves and banned grocery bags. One of the most expensive metro to live in, but you look at the states surrounding us and you get why everyone is moving here.
I'm in NY, banned grocery bags a while ago and old people constantly bitch about it still, and joke about the state taking something else mundane next.
It's so stupid and I just roll my eyes, paper bags work just fine and its like $0.05 cents a bag at checkout. My jar of tomato sauce has shrunk by 6oz and gone up $2 but it's plastic bags and the 5 cent paper bags that are the problem right?
Anyway I'm ranting. Enjoy not having plastic bags floating around your streets and parking lots.
It really is. They have done some good things, law wise, lately. Cost of living is insane. But it is a pretty swell place and I never want to leave.
Nothing is final until the federal supreme court weighs in or the election is final.
At this stage of the game all of the appeals in the world are in play.
ftfa
The court put its decision on hold until Jan. 4 to allow for further appeals. It also said that if the matter is pursued before the U.S. Supreme Court before that date, the pause will remain in effect during that time and Colorado will be required to include Trump’s name on the primary ballot pending action by the Supreme Court.
Article also mentions the supreme court in CO is appointed by all democrats. A big win would be a red state agreeing with this.
I’m not too sure about that. I think it’s pretty open and shut and scotus can’t do anything about it.
Case law has found time and again that states can decide their own election laws, and that the federal government cannot override that except in the most egregious cases.
But the very cases where they chose to defer were huge, election changing cases, like Bush v Gore and the VRA.
I don’t think they can even issue a stay without doing the exact same thing. The current stay is through the 4th because CO law says they have to set the ballots by Jan 5. So even issuing a stay would be the feds overstepping the bounds.
Overstepping their own bounds in fact, since people still on this court decided those cases, and Gorsuch actually ruled on this same Colorado law in favor of CO having the right to control its own ballot.
What this means is very possible sweep in CO, because if Trump isn’t on the ballot, that will hurt turnout which would flip some new areas blue. That’s the entire downticket from senators to dogcatchers.
I think it’s pretty open and shut and scotus can’t do anything about it.
Justice Thomas will go on a long vacation aboard a yacht and come back with a different opinion than you.
I have no doubt about that one.
The fun bit is that he voted with the majority in those other cases. He’s going to either come up with some Olympic level gymnastics or just write “No.” There’s no in between.
Actually I have MORE faith in Thomas siding with Colorado because he's corrupt. A dictator doesn't need a corrupt supreme court but a republican president does.
No, it’s much worse than that. With Trump off the ballot, Biden will automatically win. That’s an automatic 9 point loss for Trump and a 9 point gain for Biden, making Trump start at 18 points down. That’s a lot to make up.
CO would also largely blue from the senate on down because of a depressed turnout without Trump on the ballot.
if he's not on the ballot in CO, they also wouldn't ratify his election.. they may not seem big, but they have the Air Force Academy and NORAD i think..
How does that work, legally speaking? Have we ever had a President in the past century that had states that didn't allow them on the ballot? Outside of having to go all the way back to like Lincoln times.
It hurts republican downballot candidates tho. There's gonna be a number of Trump voters who won't show up if he's not on the ballot and they would have been straight ticket republican votes.
Also this sets a big precedent.
3 out of 8 of their house members are republicans, famously including Lauren Boebert. Obviously not a ton but margins in both chambers have been razor thin lately so every bit counts.
95% of the state population libe in blue areas. 5% live in the east or west and south of Colorado.
They have 3 house seats in Colorado and one of them is one of the dumbest, most toxic fucking people in congress and she (Boebert) won her seat with 50.06% of the vote.
Literally .07% of people not showing up in her election would have been a victory for her opponent. It was a 546 vote difference. That is razor thin.
Then for the other two republican house seats, one of them won with 60.9% of the vote and another won with 56% of the vote.
So your argument doesn't really hold up here. Two of those seats are arguably in jeopardy. Maybe even the third. The Republicans have the house by only 8 seats right now. Every single seat counts for a lot. Even if the democrats didn't take the house, a smaller margin prevents fucksticks like the freedom caucus from being so obstructive of bipartisan legislation.
And all of this ignores stuff like state, county, and school district level positions.
I’m still scared shitless about the prospect of him winning or being handed the presidency by GOP ghouls, but this is the most hopeful news I’ve seen in a while. Granted at this point I think any Republican candidate would be as bad or worse if they won, none of them have the hold over the base that Trump does. We’ll see if it cascades in a meaningful way but we likely won’t be out of the woods even if it does.
One interesting take here is that the states have complete autonomy, per the constitution, to do their elections however they want. They are only required to select a candidate and send electors as a state. So that could be a great side-step, to say “the state is deciding state election policy for a state, and this is not a federal matter.”
This is a lose-lose. If this is shot down, it's just another case presidents being above the law. If this goes through, the republican states will use it against democratic candidates.
One consequence of this, even though it only applies to the primary and even if it is reversed on appeal, is to effective kill any momentum the NPVIC might have had.
It really punctuated the fact that there is no such thing as a national vote when voters from different states aren't even presented with the same choices. With the electoral college in place, this mostly doesn't matter, but NPVIC would encourage the most partisan states to run up the score for their guy by any means possible.