The court heard arguments about whether the former president’s attempts to subvert the 2020 election disqualify him from again holding office. Justices across the ideological spectrum questioned several aspects of a ruling from the Colorado Supreme Court.
I mean, think of the chaotic implications of letting states determine who is eligible to be on their ballots by following a federal standard laid out in the constitution.
This is always such a spurious argument; Republicans will do what they're going to do regardless of precedent. There was no precedent for their attempt to throw out the results of last election but they did it anyway.
Republicans straight up dont give a flying fuck about rules, laws or precedent. They will always do whatever the fuck they want to do. Damn the consequences.
If they allow individual states to make their own "objective" legal determinations regarding what is or is not an insurrection then you will never have a democratic candidate on the ballot in any Republican majority controlled state ever again. They will take that as carte blanche authority to say that every single Democrat is a traitor to the Constitution, and is unfit to hold office.
Edit: I am following up because I realize what a contentious and controversial position this is, and I agree. However, the important thing to note is that this is the exact logic that was repeatedly broached by the Supreme Court itself. We can argue ad nauseum about the legitimacy of that body, but the bottom line is this: they are not going to allow Donald Trump to be unilaterally removed from the ballot. They are afraid of the ramifications of that decision, that much is clear. So, regardless of anyone's personal feelings on the matter you need to make peace with the fact that the Supreme Court is going to all but destroy the protections of Article 3 of the 14th Amendment. That is just the reality, and that means it is more important than ever that we make sure Donald Trump does not make it back to the White House. If he does, that is going to be the beginning of the end of the United States for the foreseeable future.
The worst case scenario that nobody wants to talk about is Donald Trump being able to pack additional justices onto the Supreme Court that are in their late 40's who will be on the bench for another 40 years, and guarantee the further erosion of civil rights in a way that will permanently destroy any chance for reform for the rest of your fucking life. This is not a game, this is not a drill, the Supreme Court has made it clear they are not going to do the right thing. The only remaining choice is collective action through voting or mass civil disobedience. Get ready....
Trump's main argument, though he doesn't admit to insurrection, is that he isn't technically an officer under the united states and so technically the 14th amendment doesn't apply.
He could be arguing, strongly, that he didn't commit insurrection but he's not. His lawyer basically said, "yeah, we don't admit that but it doesn't matter because of this technicality".
Its a super weak argument. Trumps lawyer gave the scotus very little reason to find in his favor other than, "if you find against us there will be a tit for tat among the states leading to chaos" which, yeah, but that's not a legal argument.
A guilt verdict for insurrection was not required for any of the other people made ineligible by the 14th Amendment, why does a different standard apply only to Donald Trump?
Couy Griffin, for a recent example, was removed from office in 2022 based on the 14th Amendment; the only thing he was found guilt of was trespassing. And after the 14th Amendment was ratified thousand of Confederates who had been convicted of nothing filed amnesty requests with Congress to remove their disqualification under the 14th Amendment because it was well understood that a conviction wasn't required.
No. It isn't. If you read the summaries I saw from today, it says the Justices didn't even discuss whether he participated in insurrection. (Ed. nor anything about conviction. What have you been reading??)
Also if you look at the original Colorado ruling, it lays out in pretty great detail, based on the evidence presented, that Trump did, in fact, participate in insurrection.
In a sense, yes. To be precise, the blame for this lies solely with inept, cowardly Merrick Garland, who took two and a half years to begin doing anything at all to hold Trump accountable. If not for Garland’s incomprehensible delays, the matter would have been settled well before ‘24 election season.