TL;DR NY Times predicts trump will remain on the ballet and the ruling will likely have a very narrow basis in hopes of achieving unanimous consensus from the court.
I don’t expect them to argue against him inciting an insurrection. I think they will argue that the office of the president isn’t a civil office of the United States as laid out in the constitution, as has been a common legal argument brought forth as of late. So they will probably have to argue that the rattifiers of the ammendment were so worried about insurrectionists taking over government that they wanted to prevent it, but not enough they thought the presidency should be barred to insurrectionists.
So they will probably have to argue that the ratifiers of the amendment were so worried about insurrectionists taking over government that they wanted to prevent it, but not enough they thought the presidency should be barred to insurrectionists
Except we have the record for for their debate saying that the 39th Congress who passed the 14th Amendment knew that the Office of the President was indeed an office to be guarded. The reason they enumerated the others in Clause 3 was because multiple people wanted to ensure that those folks too were covered.
But even if the President isn’t enumerated Trump has this problem.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
— US Constitution, 10th Amendment
So it not being specified by the Constitution nor being codified by Congress as law, how States want to look at the 14th is up to them. So even if SCOTUS wants to play the “The President is not listed” card. It’s not explicitly denied. The tenth amendment indicates that if it’s not denied, States get to run with it.
What SCOTUS can rule upon is “due process” which is asserted by the 14th clause 1. SCOTUS could indicate that the process by which Colorado took doesn’t meet this bar. But then, SCOTUS would kind of be on the hook for indicating “well what is the official process?” And if they say “Well Congress has to make it up” then we fall back into the “if Congress doesn’t say anything, States get to run with it” problem that the 10th amendment grants.
See Colorado isn’t trying to impose their will unto everyone, which means this squarely falls into a “State’s rights” kind of thing. And that’s going to get tricky for the Conservatives to word salad themselves out of that corner they’ve painted. That’s not to say they won’t, but it’s going to be an interesting read to say the least on how they rule.
I can understand their hesitancy to rule with Colorado because then it’ll open a floodgate that we all know that particular states will attempt to abuse. But boy oh boy have they been so strong on States should get to do what they want so hard that this kind of thing was just waiting to come back and bite them on the ass.
Which is some rank fucking bullshit, no way that should be unanimous.
I’m sure they’re gonna abandon all pretense of the principled “states decide” position that they used to gut the Voting Rights Act, but that should be a party line vote.
Obviously they will find some way to force him on the ballot; they are crooked hacks, after all.
I submit that the Presidency is an office (quotes like “I serve the office, not the man”) and the person holding that office is an officer. I get that sometimes the constitution can be unclear, but that one doesn’t seem like rocket science no matter how folks want to split words.
No my take is they will find he is being denied without due process. Which is arguable. Has he even been formally accused of insurrection? I mean I know we all saw it with our own eyes, but do we want to open the door to denying someone their right to run for office based on an opinion that what he did could be considered insurrection? Think about how many people trump would accuse of insurrection. Everyone that fought against him in what he would call his legitimate reelection.
So this tool needs to be used very cautiously because it could be turned to serve evil.
this tool needs to be used very cautiously because it could be turned to serve evil.
This is literally the entire strategy behind the crypto-fascist movement that is surrounding Donald Trump. These constant attempts to undermine legal safeguards and basterdize the rule of law is meant to erode public trust from all sides of the political paradigm. Any rational person understands that the spirit of the law is meant to prevent the kind of tin-pot dictator Donald Trump would like to become from seizing power. If this same situation had occurred at any other point in United States history he would have been charged with treason. The level of information warfare has so undermined the common sense discourse in this country that I have very little faith we will not slow walk into reality television authoritarianism with about 30% of the stupidest fucking knuckle-draggers among us cheering it on while it happens.
I appreciate what you’re saying here. However one of the things Trump did was constantly abuse the power of his office. He changed the fucking weather prediction with a sharpie.
The last thing we want is to give someone a tool that can be used without sufficient checks and balances to strike at his political opponents. Because you’re right it’s been plain to see what he’s been up to and a frightening percentage of the citizens are just fine with it.
