Trump Disqualified in Colorado
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Yet these puzzles are relatively mundane compared with the case’s most consequential conundrum: whether Mr. Trump really did engage in insurrection. The Colorado court, armed with dictionary definitions and the defense’s counsel’s own words (according to which Jan. 6 was “more than a riot but less than a rebellion”), lays out the evidence. The armed mob that forcibly entered the Capitol with the purpose of preventing the peaceful transfer of power, they say, was surely carrying out an insurrection. By fomenting myths of election fraud; by urging supporters at least 12 times to travel to D.C.; by exhorting them to “take back our country” when they arrived; by ignoring pleas to tell them to leave; Mr. Trump “engaged,” they say, in that insurrection, too.
As Justice Samour points out in his dissent, however, what’s missing from the majority’s analysis is due process of law. Not only has Mr. Trump not been convicted of insurrection either by a jury of his peers or from the bench by a judge; he hasn’t even been charged with it. Tellingly, Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith has brought an aggressive case against the former president for conspiracy to defraud the United States, obstruction of an official proceeding and more — but not for violating the federal law against insurrection. The penalties for that, by the way, include disqualification from “any office under the United States.”
Of course, in the United States, not just anyone can be president. Only aspirants over age 35 who are natural-born citizens may occupy the Oval Office. The difference is that these criteria are objective. Whether someone has engaged in insurrection is less so. Disqualifying a candidate based on an accusation, albeit one blessed by a state court judge as in the Colorado case — but not an actual conviction — is dangerous. What’s to stop a Republican politician from seeking to bar his Democratic opponent because the opponent attended Black Lives Matter protests, claiming that those protests, some of them nominally in service of abolishing the police, qualify as insurrection? To be clear, there is no moral equivalence between Black Lives Matter protesters and the Jan. 6 Capitol mob. But that is the point: the potential for abuse is ample.
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Always remember, Operation Valkyrie was an act of sedition.
Warning: I post things that interest me. Read and comment at your own discretion. -
@Jolly said in Trump Disqualified in Colorado:
Trump has never been charged with insurrection.
That's my question. Does there need to be a charge? For example, if AHNOLD wanted to run for President, would he need to be convicted of not being a natural born citizen before a court can rule him ineligible based on Constitutional requirements?
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We supposedly have the presumption of innocence. To deny someone a right because "you've been told" (the words of the CO Supreme Court) that someone did something bad doesn't pass muster.
I may be wrong, but there was no evidence presented, no witnesses questioned, etc. It was done by fiat because Orange Man Bad.
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@Copper said in Trump Disqualified in Colorado:
I don't know who he is, but I want the Babylon Bee guy that writes this stuff to be the next president.
He doesn’t write all of them, but he runs the team that does…
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@89th said in Trump Disqualified in Colorado:
Stupid question, but why is a criminal conviction required? It just says the person shall not have engaged in insurrection, right? I haven't paid attention to the details here since I presume SCOTUS will overturn this in about two months.
How else can one determine someone participated in an insurrection?
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@89th said in Trump Disqualified in Colorado:
@Jolly said in Trump Disqualified in Colorado:
Trump has never been charged with insurrection.
That's my question. Does there need to be a charge? For example, if AHNOLD wanted to run for President, would he need to be convicted of not being a natural born citizen before a court can rule him ineligible based on Constitutional requirements?
Big difference between an allegation of behavior and an objectively true fact.
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@89th said in Trump Disqualified in Colorado:
if AHNOLD wanted to run for President, would he need to be convicted of not being a natural born citizen before a court can rule him ineligible based on Constitutional requirements
"Convicted?" No.
However, this exact case (well, not Ahnold) was the case in which Gorsuch opined that a state can disqualify a candidate. It is the "precedent" being cited by many who support the Colorado decision.
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https://reason.com/2023/12/21/was-the-capitol-riot-an-insurrection-and-did-trump-engage-in-it/
Achieving the same result under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, by contrast, does require concluding that Trump "engaged in insurrection." But in reaching that conclusion, the Colorado Supreme Court never actually defines insurrection.
"At oral argument," the opinion notes, "President Trump's counsel, while not providing a specific definition, argued that an insurrection is more than a riot but less than a rebellion. We agree that an insurrection falls along a spectrum of related conduct." But the court does not offer "a specific definition" either: "It suffices for us to conclude that any definition of 'insurrection' for purposes of Section Three would encompass a concerted and public use of force or threat of force by a group of people to hinder or prevent the U.S. government from taking the actions necessary to accomplish a peaceful transfer of power in this country."
So it wasn't "Rape" rape.
Nor is it clear that Trump "engaged in" the "insurrection" that the court perceives. After reviewing dictionary definitions and the views of Henry Stanbery, the U.S. attorney general when the 14th Amendment was debated, the majority concludes that "'engaged in' requires 'an overt and voluntary act, done with the intent of aiding or furthering the common unlawful purpose.'"
Trump's pre-riot speech was reckless because it was foreseeable that at least some people in his audience would be moved to go beyond peaceful protest. Some 2,000 of the 50,000 or so supporters he addressed that day (around 4 percent) participated in the assault on the Capitol. But that does not necessarily mean Trump intended that result.
All of this evidence is consistent with recklessness and dereliction of duty. But it falls short of proving that Trump deliberately "encouraged the use of violence" or that he had a "specific intent" to cause a riot, let alone that he thereby "engaged in insurrection."
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The Michigan Supreme Court has rejected an attempt to remove former President Donald Trump from the 2024 ballot based on the US Constitution’s “insurrectionist ban.”
The outcome, which was generally expected, contrasts with the recent ruling from the Colorado Supreme Court, which kicked Trump off its primary ballot because of his role in the January 6 Capitol riot. That decision has been paused pending an appeal.
With these dueling decisions, the expected appeals to the US Supreme Court become even more critical, especially as the nation races toward the start of the 2024 primaries. Unlike in Colorado, the Michigan lawsuit never reached a trial and was dismissed early on in the process. An intermediate appeals court upheld the decision to toss the case on procedural grounds.
The Michigan Court of Claims judge who first got the case said state law doesn’t give election officials any leeway to police the eligibility of presidential primary candidates. He also said the case raised a political question that shouldn’t be decided in the courts.
His decision was upheld by the Michigan Court of Appeals, which said: “At the moment, the only event about to occur is the presidential primary election. But as explained, whether Trump is disqualified is irrelevant to his placement on that particular ballot.”
The order from the Michigan Supreme Court was unsigned, and the court did not release a vote count.
Unlike in Colorado, the Michigan courts rejected the case wholly on procedural grounds. They never reached the questions of whether January 6 was an insurrection and whether Trump engaged in it.
