Trump Could Be Disqualified Due Old Ruling

Donald Trump Could Be Disqualified Due to 55-Year-Old Ruling


The then U.S President, Donald Trump, addresses a rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on February 20, 2020. His opponents are now trying to keep him off the Colorado ballot after a lower court found that he had engaged in insurrection by provoking the January 6, 2021 riot at the Capitol building in Washington, D.C.
The then U.S President, Donald Trump, addresses a rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on February 20, 2020. His opponents are now trying to keep him off the Colorado ballot after a lower court found that he had engaged in insurrection by provoking the January 6, 2021 riot at the Capitol building in Washington, D.C.
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A1968 ruling in which the Peace and Freedom Party's presidential candidate was excluded from the ballot could be a basis for keeping Donald Trump off the voting cards in several states.

Trump is before the Colorado Supreme Court after a lower court found that he had engaged in insurrection against the United States regarding the U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, 2021. However, the lower court ruled that he could still stay on the ballot because it was unclear if the ban on insurrectionists taking office applied to the presidency. Trump denies any wrongdoing and has repeatedly said that the January 6, 2021 case is part of a political witch hunt against him.


Newsweek
Donald Trump Could Be Disqualified Due To 55-Year-Old Ruling
Derek T. Muller, a law professor at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, has filed a briefing to the Colorado Supreme Court. In it, he said that there have been several cases where presidential candidates were excluded from the ballot because they were deemed ineligible under the U.S constitution.
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Muller cited the 1968 case of Eldridge Cleaver, a former Black Panther leader, who ran for president for the Peace and Freedom Party, attracting support mostly from black voters, hippies and student radicals.

Muller added that California excluded Cleaver from the ballot in 1968 because he was below the 35-year-old minimum age limit for the presidency.

"Cleaver was the 33-year-old nominee of the Peace and Freedom Party. He challenged the exclusion in state court, which rejected his challenge. Cleaver petitioned for certiorari to the United States Supreme Court. Without comment, the Court rejected the petition," Muller wrote in his briefing.

He added that the case "demonstrates the fact that a state did exclude a candidate from the ballot for failure to meet the qualifications for office. And intriguingly, California excluded Cleaver even though Cleaver would become eligible during the four-year [presidential] term of office."

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Muller's view is contained in his amicus brief to the court, a brief in which an outside expert is allowed to submit a legal interpretation to the court. Muller told Newsweek that his briefing is a legal view of the case and was not filed for either side of the dispute. He added that the exclusion of Eldridge Cleaver in 1968 could be a negative precedent for Trump.

"[Trump] has argued that states have no power to judge the qualifications of candidates or that it is a political question. The historical record however suggests that in at least some cases, states have excluded candidates," Muller said.

If it's any consolation for Trump, Cleaver later renounced his radical past and joined the Republican Party.

Muller's briefing to the court also notes that, in 1972, 31-year-old presidential candidate Linda Jenness attempted to appear on the Illinois ballot as the Socialist Workers Party candidate.

"The Illinois State Electoral Board excluded her from the ballot for her failure to sign a loyalty oath and because she was underage," Muller wrote. A federal court found that the loyalty oath was unconstitutional, but also that she was underage.

Other presidential candidates were excluded because they were not U.S. citizens, Muller wrote.

"States routinely exclude ineligible candidates. In 2008, for instance, R;ger Calero, a Nicaraguan national, was the Socialist Workers Party nominee for president. In some states, Calero's name appeared on the ballot. In others, a stand-in candidate, James Harris, appeared in Calero's place in states where Calero was excluded from the ballot."

District Judge Sarah B. Wallace ruled on November 17 that Trump had incited the January 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, but that he could stay on the ballot for the 2024 presidential election.

Wallace allowed Trump to remain on Colorado's primary ballot because it is unclear whether a Civil War-era constitutional amendment barring insurrectionists from public office applies to the presidency.

Known as the disqualification clause, Section 3 of the 14th Amendment states that no person shall hold office if they have "previously taken an oath as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States" and engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the Constitution.

Trump and his opponents are appealing the decision, and the Colorado Supreme Court has agreed to hear the two appeals together.

The appeal court may accept the lower court's finding that Trump was an insurrectionist and thereby order that he be removed from the ballot under the 14th Amendment of the U.S. constitution. That would kill Trump's chances of taking nine electoral college votes in Colorado in the 2024 election, a crucial swing state.

The Colorado Supreme Court agreed to hear the case on an accelerated timetable and oral arguments were heard on December 6.

Muller said that there was a distinct possibility that the Colorado Supreme Court could exclude Trump from the ballot, but added that the odds are low.

"There are a number of things that the Colorado Supreme Court must find to exclude him from the ballot, but any one thing in Trump's favor can keep him on," Muller said.

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