Trump’s Ballot Eligibility Faces Challenges in These Other States

After Colorado, several other states sought to ban former President Donald Trump from contesting the primary election. 

Here are the details of the news. 

Trump’s Ballot Eligibility Faces Challenges in These Other States

The recent historical judgment by the Colorado Supreme Court to disqualify former President Donald Trump from the state ballot has incited many other states to challenge his eligibility to contest state primaries and again hold the office of president in 2024. 

According to Lawfare’s database, sixteen other states have pending lawsuits challenging Trump’s eligibility for president’s office. The lawsuits maintain that the former president is barred from contesting the election because of his alleged involvement in the January 6, 2021, Capitol attack.  

Of these sixteen, four states, Michigan, Oregon, New Jersey, and Wisconsin, have filed their lawsuits in state courts. At the same time, eleven states, including Alaska, Arizona, Nevada, New York, New Mexico, South Carolina, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming, have challenged Trump’s eligibility in federal district courts while there has also been a similar case in Maine.   

Also, cases in Arizona and Michigan were previously dismissed by a lower court but have been again appealed in higher judiciary.  

Invoking the 14th Amendment: A Historic Decision in Colorado

The Colorado ruling marked the use of the 14th Amendment of the American constitution for the first time to deem Trump ineligible to contest the State primary election as a presidential candidate. The decision came after a group of Colorado voters supported by the advocacy group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) brought a lawsuit against Trump, challenging his eligibility to hold office in 2024, arguing that he should not be allowed on the state ballot as per provisions in section 3 of 14th Amendment 

because the former president incited the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol through his supporters after he failed to change the 2020 election results and overturn his defeat against President Biden. 

The Trump campaign has vowed to appeal against his disqualification judgment in the U.S. Supreme Court. The Colorado Supreme Court has said to put a hold on the ruling until January 4, 2024, or the U.S. Supreme Court issued any order related to the judgment.  

The Colorado justices noted, “We are also cognizant that we travel in uncharted territory and that this case presents several issues of first impression.” Their decision could change based on “the receipt of any order or mandate from the Supreme Court.” 

Whether the nation’s highest court takes up Trump’s disqualification case is a question. According to the Colorado Department of State, if the U.S Supreme Court agrees to hear the appeal, the Colorado Supreme Court’s hold on the ruling will be temporarily removed, and the former president will become eligible for the State’s Republican primary ballot until the U.S. Supreme Court releases its final verdict for the case.  

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The U.S. Supreme Court’s intervention in Trump’s disqualification lawsuit in Colorado after his appeal would likely cancel all lawsuits in other sixteen states challenging his eligibility for the ballot. 

A former appeals court judge and a major supporter of the 14th Amendment, J. Michael Luttig, said, “If the Supreme Court takes the case, it will effectively stay the proceedings in all of the other states.” 

As such, it remains to see whether Trump’s appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court yields positive outcomes for him, allowing the former president to appear in Colorado ballots and how legal challenges to his ballot eligibility in other states affect his candidacy for the 2024 presidential race.