IIn the wake of the dispute over eligibility for the primary elections in the state of Colorado, Donald Trump has turned to the Supreme Court of the United States. A letter from Trump's lawyers on Wednesday said the Colorado Supreme Court “did not have the authority” to remove Trump from the primary election list. With the decision, a court prevented voters from casting their votes for the leading presidential candidate “for the first time in the history of the United States.” The Republican had previously announced his appeal to the Supreme Court.
The official step now increases the pressure on the nine judges to take on the crucial question with a view to the election in November. What the court decides for Colorado applies to all American states. After Colorado, the elections director in Maine also decided last week to exclude Trump from the election, citing his role in the storming of the Capitol. It has been proven that the then-President not only fueled the riot on January 6, 2021, but also failed to call for moderation among his supporters when the situation escalated.
The 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution states that anyone who has participated in an insurrection as an elected official may not become president. The clause was intended to protect the country after the Civil War against previously slave-owning Southerners who had broken away from the Union. In other states such as California, Michigan and Minnesota, attempts to remove Trump from the primary election lists failed. The first Republican primary of the year will take place in Iowa next week.
The Colorado court has suspended its decision while the appeal is pending. Since the mail-in ballots will be sent there on Friday, Trump's name is likely to be on them. If the Supreme Court in Washington later comes to the conclusion that Trump should be excluded, his votes would not be counted. The primary election in Colorado takes place on Super Tuesday on March 5th, when around a dozen states have primaries.
Trump's lawyers argue that the decision of a presidential candidate's eligibility rests with Congress, not the states. In the decision by four to three chief justices in Colorado, the reasoning said that Trump had “incited the use of violence and lawless action” and encouraged disruption of the peaceful transfer of power.
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