Colorado GOP appeal to top court's Trump disqualification decision

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
28 Dec 2023 05:22

The Colorado Republican Party says the state has interfered in the primary election by unreasonably restricting the Party’s ability to select its candidates.

Former US President and 2024 presidential hopeful Donald Trump applauds at the end of a campaign event in Waterloo, Iowa, on December 19, 2023. (Photo by KAMIL KRZACZYNSKI / AFP)

The Colorado Republican Party filed an appeal with the US Supreme Court challenging the decision by the Colorado Supreme Court to disqualify former President Donald Trump from the state ballot in the upcoming election, a court filing revealed.

"The state has interfered in the primary election by unreasonably restricting the Party’s ability to select its candidates," the document read on Wednesday.

It continued, "As a natural and inevitable result, the state has interfered with the Party’s ability to place on the general election ballot the candidate of its choice. And it has done so based on a subjective claim of insurrection the state lacks any constitutional authority to make."

Last week, an appeals court in Colorado ruled that Trump cannot appear on the state's presidential primary ballot because of his involvement in the attack on the Capitol in January 2021.

The ruling, which only applies to the Colorado primary ballot, is the first of several legal actions across the country, aimed at invoking the US Constitution's 14th Amendment, which bars from office anyone formerly sworn to protect the country who later engages in insurrection.

The legal decision follows a challenge by a group of voters who contested a previous ruling. This ruling had determined that despite clear evidence of Trump's involvement in the January 6 riot, it would not disqualify him from running for the presidency again.

That ruling hinged on the interpretation of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution that bars a person from holding "any office... under the United States" if they engaged in insurrection after taking an oath as "an officer of the United States" to support the Constitution.

But the amendment cannot apply to Trump, since the presidency is left out of the list of federal elected positions affected by the law, the lower court decided.

The court had placed its ruling on hold, anticipating an appeal to the US Supreme Court, which Trump's campaign immediately said it would seek.