And yet, that’s precisely what they’ve been doing since 2016… All they care about is getting and retaining power, and Trump has helped them do it, so they welcomed him… and even when he lost, they STILL have lined up behind him and refuse to work across party lines to deal with him.
I’m inclined to think that they’ll rule against Trump, since they’ve shown themselves to not be entirely yes men, but still… There is also Jack Smith’s request to SCOTUS about the Jan. 6th case about whether or not Trump has immunity…
And yet, that’s precisely what they’ve been doing since 2016… All they care about is getting and retaining power, and Trump has helped them do it, so they welcomed him… and even when he lost, they STILL have lined up behind him and refuse to work across party lines to deal with him.
True, but they now have four years of experience that Trump has no notable coattails to ride. I could easily imagine the conservative supremes saying “Let’s not voluntarily put our own positions of influence under the thumb of such a volatile despot.”
As an outsider frequently entirely confused by US politics, here’s the bit I’m not getting.
So are there really 3 Democrat appointed Colorado Supreme Court judges who think Trump is eligible? If so, why? Do they want him in the running because they’re convinced he will block other republicans who have more chance of winning? The legal opinions I’ve been seeing seem to think it’s a no-brainer that Trump is ineligible, but I’m not seeing any speculation on what the 3 dissenters were thinking.
At least one of the three judges is actually a Republican, he just happened to be appointed by a Democrat (which used to be a pretty normal thing before the Judicial appointment process was turned into partisan political bloodsport).
TLDR: The procedure used to hear the case is, in their view, not intended for and not appropriate for cases of this complexity and scope.
It’s a summary procedure appropriate for questions such as whether a candidate meets the age or citizenship requirement or other purely factual disputes, not for deciding whether someone engaged in insurrection.
I haven’t read closely enough to see if they express a view on how such a case should be decided.
I think proof is the main issue. Trump is credibly accused of bad stuff, but the only time he’s been tried for insurection, he was found not guilty.
If all it takes is an accusation to remove someone from the ballot then you can be fairly sure that MTG and the like will froth up some similar charges for Biden. They’re already turning Impeachment from a big honking deal into trivial political theatre, it’ll just be more of the same.
I’m sure it’ll get overturned by SCotUS and they’ll find some fun reason to do so. But I’ll bask in the joy of this moment for a while longer if you don’t mind. Nothing I love hearing more than ole Cheetos fingers has been affirmed as an insurrectionist and ineligible to further soil our highest office.
Ramaswamy has said he’ll boycott the Colorado primary elections if Trump isn’t on the ballot, which I guess gives the fourth place Republican candidate something to talk about. He’s polling at 4%, so he was barely on the ballot. He’s playing it as a “we are all Spartacus” moment, but it’s apparent he just wants to work for Nero.
Contrary to what the Republicans think, the majority of judges in this country don’t actually judges these cases based on petty political calculations. They’re actually trying to judge based on their understanding of the law, not “our team vs your team.”
The dissenters are because this is uncharted legal waters, and so reasonable people can disagree on how the law should be interpreted.
The Trumpies start from the assumption that every decision is a forgone conclusion based on your team, because that’s how they themselves operate.
Others have given good explanations, but don’t overthink anything MAGAts say. This particular statement was made by a former Ultimate Fighting Championship carnival barker who also suggests that the ruling was orchestrated by a rich Jewish puppet master. It’s not designed for consumption by rational Americans, let alone a rational international audience.
Look, this Court sucks in so many ways, but that’s just blatantly false. So I’ll turn this around on you. I get why everyone wants to temper their enthusiasm, but let’s all count to five and not predict the end of democracy in America just yet.
Even if the Supreme Court upholds this decision, it’ll be interesting to see if the Court says this is a decision applicable to the whole country, or if it rules that it is within the right of individual states to make their own determination of whether TFG can stand.
They’ve got two paths to not consider it (per “What Roman Mars Can Learn About Con Law”). The first is he’s not an officer because the president isn’t mentioned, which many conservative legal scholars think is ridiculous given that electors of the president are disqualified. The other is that this wasn’t an insurrection. That one actually might hold more weight - the 14th was written to deal with an actual civil war.
While I agree with you that the conservative majority sometimes does the right thing (albeit for the wrong reasons), I am more concerned than usual. These two cases (like Dobbs) are heavily politicised, so favours are more likely to be called in from Gorsuch, Barrett and Kavanaugh. Alito can be counted on to offer them cover with BS “Originalist” opinions, with Thomas glowering and silently nodding alongside him.
So not a sure thing for TFG in either case, but not a festival of reasoned interpretation, pure scholarship, and non-partisanship either.
If they rule in favour of Biff in both cases, the majority will be making a choice to gaslight the entire country (i.e. “the President is not an official and urging a crowd to storm the national legislature is not insurrection”). That will mark the beginning of the end of an independent judiciary in the U.S.
Well, here’s my entirely non-expert, law school student analysis.
In the immunity case, I cannot see how they rule in favor of Trump. First, he absolutely was not acting in his capacity as President. Election integrity at the state level is not part of the President’s duties. Second, and largely because of the first thing, finding him immune in this case is essentially saying that the President is entirely immune from criminal prosecution for anything he does while President, and I don’t think even Thomas wants to set that precedent. This case, to me, is pretty easy. Trump is making the same argument Nixon tried to make, and I can’t see any legal justification for it. And doing so would be giving Biden carte blanche to do whatever he wants over the next year, and I don’t think the Court wants to do that.
In the eligibility case, I have my own concerns about the Colorado ruling. I love the outcome, and I celebrated it last night. But I don’t think I really like it. And the reason why is partly because of what @nickpheas said above. This sets a precedent that the only thing you need to find someone has participated in an insurrection for the purposes of the 14th Amendment is a decision from a trial court in a civil lawsuit. The burden of proof in a civil suit is much lower than in a criminal trial. It’s a preponderance of the evidence, rather than beyond a reasonable doubt. Rules of evidence are also different in civil trials than in criminal trials. If SCOTUS upholds this, my fear is that every red state in the country will file lawsuits the next day challenging Biden’s eligibility, and they will probably claim that his failure to secure the southern border amounts to insurrection. Now, that is a bullshit legal argument, bordering on frivolous, and I don’t think a court in the country will find it persuasive. But it will still tie this election up in the courts, possibly for months, next year, and this will become the new normal for the electoral process in the US. Candidates for all kinds of offices will start getting challenged. If SCOTUS upholds this, they need to do so in a way that makes it extremely clear that it is an extremely narrow finding, applying only to this case. And even then, I’m not sure that would prevent the scenario I’m describing. That’s my fear, and it’s what makes me uncomfortable with this ruling.
Now, a conviction in the Georgia case, or in the federal case in DC, would remove all of those concerns, because then we would have a criminal conviction of actions that qualify as insurrection, and his ineligibility could be hung on that. But those cases aren’t likely to be decided before this one.
