Originally published at: U.S. Supreme Court to review Trump eligibility bans - Boing Boing
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I’m pretty sure Alina Habba is saying that to impress her boss, not send a message to Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, and Barrett. They ruled against him in 2020 when he tried to get the election results tossed out. And I’m not saying they’re going to rule against him here, but they aren’t going to do it because they think they owe him.
Anyway, my fingers and toes are crossed. I’m not confident in a good outcome, but I will stay hopeful.
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Habba just wants brownie points by pretending her thinly veiled reference to “owing him” will mean anything. They’re going to overturn the two rulings for sure, but it has nothing to do with owing him. I’m sure they’ll base their decision on 16th century crop rotation laws and 12th century inquisition legal theories with Alito’s help, because Constitution forbid we base our laws upon our actual laws and not witch hunters and other ignoble idiots.
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Alina Habba appeared on Fox News and told the justices installed by Trump that they owe it to him to rule in his favor: “Those people will step up.”
The corruption in this crowd is so blatant that I’m worried the justices in question will just shrug off what would otherwise be seen as a grave insult and just go along with whatever “originalist” nonsense Alito cooks up.
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I somehow think the court is going to end up saying that states may interpret Trump’s actions on 1/6 etc. as insurrection and, if consistent with state laws, strike him from state ballots. But that no state is obliged to do so one way or the other, the administration of state elections being an internal affair that rolls up
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We all know it comes down to Ginni Thomas.
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They may also choose a more narrow interpretation of the suit and rule that the state controls the state ballots but that political parties are private associations and whoever appears on those ballots is the choice of the private associations and governmental interference in a free speech matter is not to be tolerated.
Which would be a crap ruling unless it is clear that states may ban Trump’s name during the actual election, and may prohibit electoral collage votes for him if the state in question deems him an insurrectionist.
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That’s the theme of 2024. Good luck, everyone.
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Interestingly, I think the originalist position favors disqualifying Trump. So it will be nonsense if he tries to tie his logic to originalism.
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It wouldn’t be the first time. He’s not as clever and sneaky as his mentor Scalia was, but standards for intellectual dishonesty are declining along with everything else in American civic life these days.
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Pack the court (13 circuits = 13 SCOTUS justices seems pretty defensible); impeach Thomas; investigate Alito; add ethics rules with teeth that make recusal mandatory for cases like this — maybe add a few spare justices to accommodate?
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Agreed. Plus, overuling the states’ conduct of their own elections opens up a can of worms as a precedent. Letting the courts interfere in how Texas Republicans cheat, for instance.
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If the political party is a private organisation, what is it doing becoming the government?
/rhetorical
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What SCOTUS won’t say: “Yeah, it’s a 14A violation, and it applies to all 50 states.”
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isnt it representing the government? guess they will rule like stripes said; cant forbid them whoever they want as their candidate, but that doesnt mean the government (the people) has to let him stand for national election afterwards.
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A political party does not become the government. Individual people do. You don’t vote for “the democratic senator”, you vote for a person. The Democratic Party doesn’t get to replace that person with a different person just because they feel like it.
Of corse when I say “you don’t vote for the democratic candidate” I’m right, but also very wrong. Many, probably most people choose based on party and either ignore the rest or maybe don’t even know it.
As a legal matter you don’t vote for the letter D or R after the name, you vote for the name. Also as a legal matter for presidential elections you are only voting to advise a small panel of electors from your state on how you would prefer they vote weeks later. So maybe picking a person not a party is just another quaint technicality…
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Well…it’s going to depend a lot on what exactly they decide. They could decide that Colorado and Maine are within their rights to decide on eligibility on their primary ballots, and not make a broader ruling on Trump’s eligibility under the 14th. That would basically leave it up to each state, and would result in chaos, with states like Texas almost immediately declaring Biden ineligible. They could decide section 3 of the 14th Amendment doesn’t apply to the President and Vice President, which would end this track to prevent Trump from being President. They could decide it does apply, but that Trump didn’t participate in an insurrection. They could decide it does apply, and that January 6 wasn’t an insurrection. Or they could decide it does apply, January 6 was an insurrection, and Trump supported it, and is ineligible to be President. And if they decide that last one, it would apply to all 50 states. I think that’s unlikely, but who knows? Maybe between Gorsuch, Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Barrett, two of them will find their spines and realize this is a good way to be done with Trump once and for all.
ETA: I forgot one possible ruling, and it’s the one the intellectual side of my brain prefers. They could find that section 3 of the 14th Amendment does apply to the President, but that Trump would need to have been found guilty by a court of law of some crime connected to the events of January 6. In other words, they could punt. This could still end up resulting in his ineligibility, but probably not in time for the election. Why do I like this option? Because it sets an easy to apply rule that doesn’t require future lawsuits. It will cutoff any state wanting to declare Biden, or any future candidate they don’t like, ineligible. It’s not the result my heart wants, but I think it’s the correct decision.
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I think this is the most likely, because they are cowards.
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Agreed. They will probably hide behind due process and claim he needs to have been convicted specifically of violating Title 18 U.S. Code 2383, the one about insurrection or rebellion. They’ll claim that to bar Trump from running before conviction would violate his due process rights
One of the many reasons it was so frustrating that the federal case took so long to get moving. 
ETA: this is probably one of the best scenarios for the US. Because of all the chaos @danimagoo mentioned if they do say the determination is up to each state. They will never just straight out say he’s barred from holding office.
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