Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court pose for their official photo at the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., on October 7, 2022. | Source: OLIVIER DOULIERY / Getty
The Colorado Supreme Court’s disqualification of Donald Trump from the state’s ballot is not only expected to be appealed, but it’s also likely that the U.S. Supreme Court will overturn the decision in a ruling that will expose a fault of hypocrisy among the nation’s most powerful judiciary.
At least, that’s how Elie Mystal sees it.
The writer, attorney and cultural critic reacted to Tuesday’s surprise ruling with cynicism tempered by both historical precedent and the fact that the U.S. Supreme Court is dominated by conservatives, three of whom were successfully nominated by Trump.
In case you missed, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that Trump can’t appear on state ballots for the 2024 election because the 14th Amendment precludes anyone who participated in an insurrection from doing so. The Colorado Supreme Court pointed to Trump’s documented behavior before and during the infamous Capitol riots on Jan. 6, 2021, as the U.S. Senate was certifying Joe Biden’s presidency. Notably, Trump encouraged his supporters to “fight like hell” or else, he warned, “you’re not going to have a country anymore.”
Such actions encouraging violence prevent Trump from being on the ballot, the Colorado Supreme Court concluded.
A rep for Trump’s campaign quickly vowed to appeal the decision in Colorado.
“The Colorado Supreme Court issued a completely flawed decision tonight and we will swiftly file an appeal to the United States Supreme Court and a concurrent request for a stay of this deeply undemocratic decision,” Steven Cheung said in a statement. “We have full confidence that the U.S. Supreme Court will quickly rule in our favor and finally put an end to these un-American lawsuits.”
Appearing on MSNBC shortly after the Colorado decision was rendered, Mystal suggested Cheung is probably right about how the U.S. Supreme Court will react to the appeal.
“Of course the Supreme Court is going to weigh in and likely overturn the Colorado state supreme court’s interpretation of Colorado state law because the conservatives on the [U.S.] Supreme Court who usually go on and on and on about states’ rights are hypocrites,” Mystal said before predicting “they will be hypocritical in this situation and they will overturn Colorado’s own state court process.”
Mystal said overturning the ruling would be a grave misstep and explained how the Colorado Supreme Court likely anticipated an appeal by taking steps to incorporate U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch’s own words in its majority opinion.
Gorsuch, a Denver native who was a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit in his hometown when Trump nominated him for the U.S. Supreme Court, previously authored the majority opinion in a 2012 case that deferred to the state’s right to decide a candidate’s eligibility to appear on the ballot.
“If Gorsuch had any logical consistency, he would likely uphold the Colorado state court opinion,” Mystal continued before predicting the opposite. “But what we’re about to see is just how, again, hypocritical and unserious the [U.S.] Supreme Court is when it comes to protecting their partisan sugar daddies like Donald Trump.”
In its decision Tuesday, the Colorado Supreme Court wrote that “it is ‘a state’s legitimate interest in protecting the integrity and practical functioning of the political process’ that ‘permits it to exclude from the ballot candidates who are constitutionally prohibited from assuming office.’”
The court also added:
“We conclude that they [state courts] do, provided their legislatures have established such authority by statute. Analyzing the relevant provisions of the Election Code, we then conclude that the General Assembly has given Colorado courts the authority to assess presidential qualifications and, therefore, that the Electors have stated a proper claim under sections 1-4-1204 and 1-1-113.”
“We conclude that certifying an unqualified candidate to the presidential primary ballot constitutes a ‘wrongful act.’ Were we to adopt President Trump’s view, Colorado could not exclude from the ballot even candidates who plainly do not satisfy the age, residency, and citizenship requirements of the Presidential Qualifications Clause of Article II.”
Multiple similar challenges to keeping Trump off the ballot in other states have been already rejected, making Colorado the lone state to disqualify the former president.
If Colorado’s decision is upheld, Trump would not be listed as a candidate on the primary and general election ballots, possibly affecting his presumptive presidential nomination by the Republican Party.
The decision in Colorado came as Trump, indicted four times this year – including a federal indictment alleging he tried to overturn the 2020 election – is mired in legal cases that will likely extend well into the election year and possibly beyond.
However, Trump remains the Republican frontrunner and multiple surveys have Trump and Biden in a virtual dead heat.
And the New York Times also published an article Wednesday morning on how what would typically be bad news for any candidate – multiple legal woes and ballot challenges – has only resulted in growing support for Trump.
This is America.
SEE ALSO:
How Trump’s Georgia Indictment Provides A Legal Path To Keep Him Off The Ballot In 2024
Majority Of U.S. Voters Don’t Want Trump Or DeSantis As President, New Polls Suggest
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