The U.S. Supreme Court has no other choice than to decide whether former President Donald Trump remains on ballots in states seeking to remove him, legal experts say.
Colorado's Supreme Court and Maine's secretary of state both have determined that Trump is ineligible to remain on their respective state's election ballot.
The high courts in Michigan and Minnesota, meanwhile, allowed Trump to remain on those states' primary ballots, and California's secretary of state decided likewise this week.
Trump's legal team is preparing to file challenges to the Colorado and Maine decisions as soon as Tuesday, The New York Times reported.
The various results likely mean the U.S. Supreme Court will rule one way or the other concerning Trump's ballot eligibility.
"The Colorado case definitely increased the likelihood that the U.S. Supreme Court will intervene," Doug Spencer, a law professor at the University of Colorado, told the Washington Examiner.
"It's true that the Supreme Court often takes up cases when there is a divide among the federal circuits. But the same is not true when there is a divide among state Supreme Courts. That is especially true when, as is the case here, the cases are decided on state law grounds."
Still, other legal experts agree that the country's high court will offer a ruling.
"Ultimately this is just going to have to be decided by the Supreme Court," professor Ray Brescia of Albany Law School told the Examiner.
Brescia added that his thinking is in part due to the "different procedural postures" the states have taken.
Lawsuits seeking to remove Trump from the ballot have been filed in about 30 states, but more than half have already been dismissed, The Guardian reported.
The outlet added that there are active lawsuits in 14 states: Alaska, Arizona, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, South Carolina, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming — seeking to remove Trump ahead of their primaries, citing Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
That amendment, cited in Colorado’s Supreme Court’s 4-3 ruling on Dec. 19, contains a clause that blocks anyone who has "engaged in insurrection or rebellion" against the government from holding elected office if they had previously taken an oath "to support the Constitution of the United States."
One reason the U.S. Supreme Court’s intervention seems inevitable is the differing legal viewpoints about whether Trump is required to be found guilty of the crime of "insurrection" before he can be deemed constitutionally ineligible for having "engaged" in one.
Brescia told the Examiner that Trump’s challengers have a higher burden than the former president when it comes to the ballot fight.
"It is much harder for the people who want to keep the former president off the ballot to win before the Supreme Court than it is for people who want him to stay on it," Brescia said. "I think this is a triple bank shot where you're sort of trying to jump the cue ball onto a neighboring table,” he added, using a billiards analogy.
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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