Former President Donald Trump’s appeal of a Colorado ruling barring him from the ballot may force the U.S. Supreme Court to weigh in directly on his 2024 election prospects, a case that legal experts said will likely pull its nine justices into a political firestorm.
That state was the first, followed by Maine, to rule that Trump was disqualified from seeking the Republican presidential nomination due to his actions ahead of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, an unprecedented legal decision that the nation’s top court could find too pressing to avoid.
“I doubt that any of the justices are pleased that they’re being forced into the fray over Donald Trump’s future. But it seems to me that the court will have no choice but to face these momentous issues,” said attorney Deepak Gupta, who has argued cases before the Supreme Court.
The justices, Gupta said, will have to act with “unusual speed and, hopefully, in a way that does not further divide our deeply divided land. That is a daunting and unenviable task.”
They just rule it’s within Colorado and Maine’s rights to determine who’s on their ballot. Like it is. Realistically this unfortunately probably helps Trump cause he was never gonna win either of those states and big bad liberals trying to keep Trump out plays great to the base and will get his supporters out to the polls.
They could choose to point out Trump has not been found guilty of a 14th amendment offense in a court of law and enforce innocent until proven guilty and say after a guilty verdict, maybe.
This seems really obvious to me. I mean of course we all know he’s guilty, but even I think it would be bad precedent to act before a conviction - from then on, every election the Republicans will immediately try to disqualify whoever the Democrat(s) opposing them are the same way (just with made up crimes)
I always assumed that was the strategy. Trump has a huge handful of lawsuits in the pipeline. None of them will technically prevent him from holding office. This specific ruling will make it clear, “Yes, he is disqualified.”
I’m not confident it’s necessary, but I understand the legal argument that it should be more clear, which is what this does.
I’m not sure what you are saying. The supreme court is clearly not going to rule that he’s disqualified. Like the grandparent comment said - he’s not convicted, so he’ll stay on the ballots.
Right. But without this case, what happens when he is eventually convicted of insurrection?
We would have to go through all the legal arguments we’re going through now.
This case is being brought up now so that we already have the answer.
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