The Colorado Supreme Court has taken the extraordinary step of barring Donald Trump from the state’s 2024 presidential ballot. By a vote of 4-3, the court’s majority ruled that Trump’s conduct related to the January 6th Capitol attack violates the 14th Amendment’s prohibition on insurrectionists running for office.
This marks the first time a state has officially disqualified a candidate under that provision. The Colorado Supreme Court’s decision will be stayed until January 4th to allow Trump’s campaign to appeal to the US Supreme Court.
“As our detailed recitation of the evidence shows, President Trump did not merely incite the insurrection,” the majority wrote in its opinion. “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. These actions constituted overt, voluntary, and direct participation in the insurrection.”
“We conclude that the foregoing evidence, the great bulk of which was undisputed at trial, established that President Trump engaged in insurrection,” the opinion added. “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.”
“Moreover, the evidence amply showed that President Trump undertook all these actions to aid and further a common unlawful purpose that he himself conceived and set in motion: prevent Congress from certifying the 2020 presidential election and stop the peaceful transfer of power,” the opinion said.
Defying accusations of base partisanship, the 4-3 decision comes from a Colorado Supreme Court where all the justices were appointed by Democratic governors. It is the first time ever a court has used Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to say a presidential candidate cannot run, according to AP news.
Shortly after the verdict was anounced, Trump’s campaign spokesman released a statement filled with conspiracy theories and antisemitic tropes, calling the plaintiffs in the case “a Soros-funded, left-wing group.” It also affirmed that Trump is appealing the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
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