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Trump name on the 2024 ballot rests in Supreme Court hands

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mystery-ak:
Trump name on the 2024 ballot rests in Supreme Court hands
By
Kaelan Deese
February 7, 2024 10:30 am

The Supreme Court will consider one of its most high-stakes cases in years on Thursday, one that will have enormous implications for former President Donald Trump‘s efforts to rid himself of a plague of litigation seeking his removal from 2024 presidential election ballots under the “insurrection” clause of the 14th Amendment.

Trump is the leading candidate for the Republican nomination but is facing a major legal hurdle to secure that title in one of the biggest high court cases since Bush v. Gore. A group of Republican and unaffiliated voters in Colorado sued to disqualify Trump from running for office again on the basis that he engaged in insurrection by trying to overturn his loss in the 2020 election and that those efforts led to him “inciting” the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

The plaintiffs’ case rests on the shoulders of the argument that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, a Civil War-era constitutional provision intended to keep former officeholders who “engaged in insurrection” from ever regaining power, applies to Trump due to his actions in the final days of his term in office.

Colorado’s Supreme Court made the unprecedented decision on Dec. 19 to agree with the voters who sued to block him from running for president. Just days later, Democratic Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows held that state law allows her the power to rule on a similar complaint lodged by Maine voters, and she found that Trump cannot remain on the ballot in response to a lawsuit in that state.

more
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/justice/2841085/trumps-existence-2024-ballot-rests-in-supreme-court-hands/

DefiantMassRINO:
My ignorant opinion:

- elections are state and local
- ballots are state and local
- there are other disqualifications for Presidency
- Clause 3 of the 14th Amendment offers remedy for anyone who wants to contest disqualification

Since the US Supreme Court has been leaning into states' rights:

- the US Supreme Court will refuse to hear the Trumps' appeal
- the US Supreme Court will return the appeal to that state's supreme court

I don't think the US Supreme Court will directly affirm nor directly overturn it on appeal.  They may have offer an opinion of regarding adequate or inadequate state due process.

Fourteenth Amendment  Equal Protection and Other Rights

    Section 3 Disqualification from Holding Office

    No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, 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. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Maj. Bill Martin:

--- Quote from: DefiantMassRINO on February 07, 2024, 05:32:42 pm ---My ignorant opinion:

- elections are state and local
- ballots are state and local
--- End quote ---

Remember that it was SCOTUS that shot down the attempts by many states to impose term limits on their own members of Congress, so clearly it is not reluctant to step into things impacting federal office holders.  It also was the Supreme Court that shutdown the ability of states to have one house of their own legislatures based on counties (kind of like the Senate...) rather than by population.   So while the actual mechanics of an election are general controlled by the states,  the Feds definitely have played a major role.

With that being said, I believe there's a near zero chance that the Supreme Court permits individual states to make independent determinations about whether a particular candidate engaged in an insurrection against the federal government.  The idea that different states could reach different conclusions on that, with perhaps some being in bad faith simply to exclude disfavored candidates, is the exact opposite of the kind of consistent legal interpretations the Supreme Court wants on matters of federal importance.

So, it is my opinion that SCOTUS will strike down those state actions, essentially on the grounds that it is not within the purview of the states to determine whether or not a candidate has engaged in an insurrection against the federal government. I believe it most likely that the court will point to section 5 of the 14th Amendment, which specifically references Congress's right to pass enforcement legislation. The Court may determine that such legislation does not exist, and therefore nobody can lawfully be barred from office for insurrection.  Or, it may determine that the World War II era law passed regarding insurrection and rebellion, which can be found at 18 USC 2383, is the proper vehicle. But because there has not been a conviction under that statute, nobody can be barred from office.

I personally think that relying on 18 USC 2383 is the cleanest route for the Court. If an individual was convicted under that statute, and the conviction was upheld on appeal, then a state could rely upon that conviction in barring someone from federal office.  If the court goes that route, I expect they will drop a footnote saying they are not opining on the constitutionality of that act as a whole, because I think the language in that Act is broader than that under the 14th Amendment and would be unconstitutional to that extent.

It is possible that the court will decide the case by concluding that the prohibition does not apply to the office of the presidency.  In some ways, that makes a lot of sense because of the president is the head of the government, so how can he commit an insurrection?  In my view, a president could not commit an insurrection until after staying in office past the point where his term legally expired.

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