A judge has rejected three more attempts by former President Donald Trump and the Colorado GOP to shut down a lawsuit seeking to block him from the 2024 presidential ballot in the state based on the 14th Amendment’s “insurrectionist ban.”
The flurry of rulings late Friday from Colorado District Judge Sarah Wallace are a blow to Trump, who faces candidacy challenges in multiple states stemming from his role in the January 6, 2021, insurrection. He still has a pending motion to throw out the Colorado lawsuit, but the case now appears on track for an unprecedented trail this month.
A post-Civil War provision of the 14th Amendment says US officials who take an oath to uphold the Constitution are disqualified from future office if they “engaged in insurrection” or have “given aid or comfort” to insurrectionists. But the Constitution does not spell out how to enforce the ban, and it has been applied only twice since the 1800s.
Votes for ineligible candidates are basically ignored. That’s true if you vote for some cartoon character like Mickey Mouse, or someone who can’t be elected president for some reason like Obama (who has been elected the maximum number of possible times).
A candidate who’s on the ballot for any state is running for the presidency in a real sense, and major declared candidates often aren’t yet on the ballot. To be a viable candidate you need to be on the ballot for states/territories totalling 270 electoral votes, since this is the bare minimum to be capable of winning. During my lifetime there have usually been about 4 candidates on most/all ballots including the green and libertarian candidates on 48 and 50 states’ ballots in 2020 respectively.
To add to this, technically Trump could still be elected president even without Colorado, but he would have to flip another state or multiple states to get to the 270 electoral votes.
Keep in mind Colorado went for Biden by a margin of 13% last time - it trends blue-ish/purple, so if Trump becomes the nominee, his path to 270 would probably not count on Colorado.
What this might do is deaden down ballet GOP candidates. The GOP wouldn’t put up a replacement presidential candidate for just Colorado, so it would be write in only and that could mean less GOP straight ticket voters, impacting House and state elections.
One last thought - even if Trump loses this bid to remain on the ballot, I sincerely doubt it would impact his chances of being the party’s nominee.
Also CO went to Hillary in 16. CO will not go to Trump in 2024 even if he is on the ballot.
Objective reality hasn’t played a role in their decision making so far.