Colorado Supreme Court Tosses Trump Off Ballot Over Insurrection Role

DENVER — In a decision sure to roil the 2024 presidential election, the Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday barred former President Donald Trump from appearing on the state’s primary ballot after determining that he did indeed engage in insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021.

The landmark ruling is the first time a court has denied a presidential candidate a place on the ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which prevents insurrectionists from holding office.

The law was passed in the wake of the Civil War and was originally intended to prevent former Confederates from serving in elected office. 

Scholars have been divided on the issue of whether the same rule should apply to Trump, but the question is currently before judges in several states ahead of the 2024 contest.

The ruling outraged Trump supporters in Congress, most notably, House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., who issued a blistering statement as word of the court’s decision spread like wildfire Tuesday evening.

“Four partisan Democrat operatives on the Colorado Supreme Court think they get to decide for all Coloradans and Americans the next presidential election,” Stefanik said. 

“This is unAmerican and Democrats are so afraid that President Trump will win on Nov. 5, 2024, that they are illegally attempting to take him off the ballot,” she continued. “Like the rest of the unprecedented, constant and illegal election interference against President Trump, this will backfire and further strengthen President Trump’s winning campaign to save America.”

Steven Cheung, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, also dismissed the ruling as part of a left-wing plot against the former president, calling it the unsurprising outcome of a “George Soros-funded, left-wing group’s scheme to interfere in an election on behalf of Crooked Joe Biden.”

The group he was referring to is the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a D.C.-based watchdog group that says its mission is to take actions that “hold people in power to account.”

Cheung went on to claim that Democratic Party leaders are in a state of paranoia over the lead Trump appears to have amassed in recent polls. 

“They have lost faith in the failed Biden presidency and are now doing everything they can to stop the American voters from throwing them out of office next November,” the Trump spokesman said. “The Colorado Supreme Court issued a completely flawed decision tonight and we will swiftly file an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court and a concurrent request for a stay of this deeply undemocratic decision.

“We have full confidence that the U.S. Supreme Court will quickly rule in our favor and finally put an end to these unAmerican lawsuits,” he added.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La, later weight in, calling the court’s “attempt” to disqualify Trump from the Colorado ballot “nothing but a thinly veiled partisan attack.

“Regardless of political affiliation, every citizen registered to vote should not be denied the right to support our former president and the individual who is the leader in every poll of the Republican primary,” Johnson said. “We trust the U.S. Supreme Court will set aside this reckless decision and let the American people decide the next President of the United States.”

And Colorado’s own, Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo, attacked the decision, calling it “extreme judicial activism” designed to “suppress the vote and voices of hundreds of thousands of Coloradans.”

Calling the situation, “absolutely unacceptable,” Boebert also expressed confidence that the U.S. Supreme Court would overturn the state court’s ruling.

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, who was the defendant in the case due to her role as chief elections official in the state of Colorado, issued a far briefer statement Tuesday night, saying simply, “The Colorado Supreme Court has ruled that Donald Trump is barred from the Colorado ballot for inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection and attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election. 

“This decision may be appealed. I will continue to follow court guidance on this important issue,” she said.

Griswold was sued in September by six Republican and unaffiliated Colorado voters who argued she must disqualify Trump from the Colorado ballot based on the language of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

That section, also known as the disqualifying clause, states:

“No person shall be a senator or representative in Congress, or elector of president and vice-president, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any state, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”

After a weeklong trial in November, Colorado District Judge Sarah B. Wallace, presiding in Denver, ruled that Trump had engaged in insurrection but could remain on the ballot because she determined Section 3 does not apply to those running for president.

The voters, who filed their suit with the help of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, appealed the part of the ruling that kept him on the ballot, while Trump appealed the part that concluded that he had engaged in insurrection.

In Tuesday’s decision, the state Supreme Court said it agreed with the voters and that it believes Trump is disqualified from holding the office of president under the 14th Amendment. 

“Because he is disqualified, it would be a wrongful act under the Election Code for the Colorado secretary of state to list him as a candidate on the presidential primary ballot,” the ruling said.

The decision sets up a split in state jurisprudence on the question. In separate earlier cases, both the Minnesota Supreme Court and a Michigan appeals court declined to remove Trump’s name from the primary ballot in those states.

In Colorado, plaintiff Norma Anderson, a former Republican majority leader of the Colorado House, said she and her fellow plaintiffs brought the case to “protect the right to free and fair elections enshrined in our Constitution and to ensure Colorado Republican primary voters are only voting for eligible candidates.”

“Today’s win does just that,” she said. 

“Long before this lawsuit was filed, I had already read Section 3 of the 14th Amendment and concluded that it applied to Donald Trump, given his actions leading up to and on Jan. 6. I am proud to be a petitioner, and gratified that the Colorado Supreme Court arrived at the same conclusion we all did,” Anderson said.

Meanwhile, Noah Bookbinder, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said the court’s decision affirmed that Trump is an insurrectionist.

“It is not only historic and justified, but is necessary to protect the future of democracy in our country,” Bookbinder said. “Our Constitution clearly states that those who violate their oath by attacking our democracy are barred from serving in government. It has been an honor to represent the petitioners, and we look forward to ensuring that this vitally important ruling stands.”

Dan can be reached at [email protected] and @DanMcCue