Former Libertarian Congressman Justin Amash weighed in on a recent decision by the Colorado Supreme Court that ruled former President Donald Trump ineligible to appear on the state’s primary ballot for the upcoming 2024 presidential election.
The ruling of the Colorado Supreme Court was based on the 14th Amendment’s ban on insurrectionists holding public office, with a 4 to 3 decision determining that Trump engaged in insurrection on January 6, 2021.
Justin Amash, the first and only Libertarian member of Congress and a vocal critic of Trump during his time in office, posted on X Tuesday evening expressing his concerns about the ruling. In his post, Amash remarked, “The opinion of the Colorado Supreme Court is shameful and runs completely counter to our constitutional system.”
Amash further highlighted that Congress never formally voted to remove Trump from office, nor was he ever criminally convicted in a court of law, and that these factors should be considered when determining a candidate’s eligibility. He stated, “No legislative, executive, or judicial body of a state should engage in extraconstitutional decision-making to disqualify a federal candidate from the ballot.”
“This isn’t accountability; it’s an assault on due process of law. It undermines our electoral system and threatens every federal candidate for office,” Amash added.
The ruling effectively removes Trump from the Republican primary ballot in Colorado, with the state’s primary election scheduled for Super Tuesday in early March.
The full content of his post can be seen below:
https://twitter.com/justinamash/status/1737290705024794661
The recent decision is likely not the final word on the matter, as Colorado justices temporarily paused their ruling to allow Trump to appeal it to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Thanks to Amash.
I would suggest to Amash (and also others) also if not first focus on the more primary Libertarian issues. I mean, a court of people created by parties that make suppressing Libertarian Party ballot access an art form, coming up with a politicized election decision, who knew? While crying vote interference and insurrection the Democrats and Republicans were dissolving/attempting to dissolve state Libertarian parties. That’s a good topic. Plus ‘insurrection’ is being misused to prosecute civil riots, etc. The ballot statutes in most states are a disaster, etc. Plus how about demanding a post-election survey to see how people say they actually voted?
As to Colorado–the Libertarian position is: End the government coercive ballot monopoly and let electors enter their own ballots as they wish as was previously done, before the Democrats and Republicans turned (as often happens) the convenience of pre-printed ballots into a mandate then an increasingly politicized monopoly.
No one can be denied being on a ballot if the voter desires. Whether they are qualified to serve is a another matter, but the remedy is impeachment and conviction.
In addition, I reflect that people voting for a non-qualified provides valuable social information. If many voters vote for Mickey Mouse or Non of the Above, or vote for Obama in a landslide, or the Pope, that tells us something.
Also, federal juries have no meaningful voire dire (selection of jury by litigants instead of judge) and a federal jury conviction tends to be more politicized then local ones.
SCOTUS seems of two minds on these matters, waiting for L/libertarians to develop a strong public momentum. As to manner and time of elections in the case of the President/VEEP, that is the province of state upper bodies. They could mandate flipping a coin if they desired. They should not attempt to limit electors.
RE (Starchild): “the anti-libertarian view that secession from the United States is prohibited.”
No. I know a lot of people say so, but no. In the case of the US, the union of states (as a freer trade/travel zone based on the concepts of the BoR) was from the beginning indissoluble. This doesn’t mean no pathways to high state autonomy or limiting the runaway Congress, but a secessionable state would be a commonwealth like Puerto Rico that can leave at will, or the Libertarian end game of extending dependent nation high-autonomy status to any group of say 5,000 homes that so desire/high local autonomy down to condominium associations.
In my view the 14th Amendment died in applicability with the Civil War generation for whom it was intended. The Amendment officialized the bargain by which the Southern States became functional again. Section 1, like many ‘rights’ Amendments to the Constitution, re-iterates implications of the Second Amendment and was widely understood as operant until the Southern criminals trying to give legal status to improper involuntary servitude/slavery got cute. It wisely excluded the President reiterating previous common law grounds, and as the person in charge of stamping out insurrections to undemocratically replace officials to begin with. Since they failed to put in a termination-time clause, if the courts come up with tolerable interpretations, L/libertarians can note the irregularity but otherwise roll with it.
As to the details of the Colorado decision and rejoinders to SCOTUS–I’ve just begun to read them. I’ve no opinion for now.
Hi Starchild. Leaving Trump aside, is it your position that the voters should be able to elect anyone as President regardless of whether they are legally eligible? I mean that “should” not in a philosophical sense, but within the current context of the laws that we have to work within. If Barack Obama announces he’s running again, should he be allowed on the ballot?
Starchild, is there a way? Yes. Texas, Virginia, and Mississippi had not been allowed to vote in 1868. So the readmission process would have had to have been accelerated. Wikipedia says the Klan was successful in suppressing unwanted voters in a few Southern states in that election. It would have had to have been more quickly organized in other states. Buchanan won in 1856, so it isn’t like there wasn’t enough popular support for “states rights slavery” to win within recent memory.
Donald Trump and his co-conspirators should go to Prison.
Trump should not be allowed to hold Office ever again.
He should not be allowed to appear on any ballot.
There is a new Trump song that tells the tale:
“Zero One One Three Five Eight Oh Nine”
Jim – I don’t think there’s any way that Jefferson Davis would have been elected president of the United States in 1868 had he been allowed to run, do you?
Gee, Justin, I thought the 14th Amendment WAS part of our constitution.
Note to Darryl Perry: Yea, and too bad. The one thing actually wrong about Reconstruction is that it had 20,000 troops in the South for a decade instead of 200,000 for a generation.
Ryan: A George Floyd protest isn’t insurrection.
Robert Capozzi: It was, and Jack— Chansley should be barred. Beyond Trump, he’s been tried and convicted.
The only actual question with Trump is “ripeness,” as he’s not been indicted on anything directly related to J6 at the Capitol, let alone convicted.
Starchild … what do you think the oppression of blacks would have been like if Jefferson Davis had been elected President in 1868 instead of US Grant?
Despite my strong preference that Donald Trump never hold office again, I concur with Justin Amash on this. Letting government officials bar a popular candidate from running for office is terribly dangerous for democracy, no matter how poorly deserved his popularity. Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee should not have been barred from running for president either. Preventing them from doing so did not stop the oppression of blacks in the South during the subsequent Jim Crow era, and no doubt helped further the anti-libertarian view that secession from the United States is prohibited.
GB: “Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.”
me: Thanks for this cite. I’m unsure whether some of the J6ers fit this law or not. Have they been charged with this law? I’m seeing several charges of “conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding,” but no “insurrection.”
While I’d love to see Trump just go away, I’ve seen no evidence that he “incited” or “g[a]ve aid or comfort” to some of the J6ers. From what I’ve seen, at least, he did suggest they protest to “stop the steal” at the Congress. This seems far short of this law’s plain language.
Ryan – The difference between an insurrection and a riot is the intention to overthrow the government. Burning down a police station without the intent to overthrow the government would be a riot. Burning down a police station with the intent to replace the existing government with an autonomous zone would be an insurrection.
Simply damaging some property and killing a few people at the capital would be considered a riot. Doing so with the intention to “stop the steal” i.e. prevent Biden from taking office, is an insurrection.
The 14th specifically applies to those “having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States”. No one is trying to “weasel out” of anything by saying it doesn’t apply to the QAnan Shamon and the vast majority of people at the Jan 6 insurrection, nor the vast majority of George Floyd rioters.
The most direct comparison to Trump and January 6th would be the Knights of the Golden Circle conspiracy to kidnap Lincoln while Lincoln was on his way to being sworn into office and to install James Buchanan’s VP, John Breckinridge, as President. That plot involved Buchanan’s VP, Secretary of War, Secretary of the Treasury, and various US Senators.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_of_the_Golden_Circle#Plans_to_seize_Lincoln_and_inaugurate_Breckinridge_as_president
“The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.”
Congress has in fact legislated on the subject – (18 U.S.C. § 2383) states:
“Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.”
(June 25, 1948, ch. 645, 62 Stat. 808; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, §?330016(1)(L), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2147.)
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2383
This legislation is still in effect.
GB: Accusations of Judicial overreach are plainly wrong, since it is the job of the Courts to apply the Constitution in situations of this nature.
me: Except that Section 5 of 14A says: “The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.”
There are many examples of court decisions keeping candidates off the ballot. I
In 2012, the Michigan Republican Party sued to keep Gary Johnson off the ballot because of Michigan’s sore loser law. Did not hear any prominent Republican challenge this court decision.
In 1968, Eldridge Cleaver, Peace & Freedom Party candidate for President, was kept off the California ballot because he was unqualified by reason of age.
In 1976 Democratic Parties in several states went to court to keep Eugene McCarthy off the ballot.
The plain text of the 14th Amendment indicates that an officeholder who took an Oath to Defend the Constitution cannot violate that Oath and expect to seek office again.
Many laws can be enforced without a court judgment of guilt. The Gun Control Act of 1968 makes it illegal for a person using a controlled substance to possess a firearm. No conviction of possession or use of a controlled substance is needed to find someone guilty of breaking the law, as Hunter Biden is finding.
Asset forfeiture also do not require a conviction of a crime for the government to seize the assets. In this case as with the Gun Control Act of 1968, there is a clear violation of due process and personal rights. But as with other qualifications needed to be put on the ballot for public office, a court has the power to consider that violations of the 14th Amendment make a candidate unqualified for the ballot.
The majority of the Colorado Supreme Court read the plain text of the 14th Amendment. They showed that they are not making a power grab by immediately staying their own decision pending an appeal to the Supreme Court. Accusations of Judicial overreach are plainly wrong, since it is the job of the Courts to apply the Constitution in situations of this nature.
There’s also Eugene Debs. Debs was put in jail during World War I charged with and convicted of sedition for encouraging resistance to the military draft. That conviction was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. Debs famously ran for President from jail being on the ballot of most states.
“Jacob Chansley — the Q-Anon Shaman — is apparently trying to run for Congress as an L in AZ. I wonder if he will be barred as well for being an “insurrectionist.”
They’re already trying to weasel this some by saying it only applies to Trump because he took an oath of office.
Trying to think of clear examples of other insurrections other than the Civil War, I’d think the Shays Rebellion in Massachusetts in pre-Constitution 1780s U.S. qualifies, as would the Dorr Rebellion in Rhode Island in the 1840s. I’d have to think the New York Draft Riots would be. North Carolina Democrats largely threw a fit out in public circa 1900 when Republicans, Populists, blacks, and other forces fused together to win the Governor’s race, the only time between the end of Reconstruction and 1976 that the Democrats did not hold the Governor’s mansion. One instance they ransacked the City of Wilmington with lynchings going on.
In recent times, the George Floyd Riots were pretty insurrection-y in a few places if you damaged or took over city property. (Good luck arguing “political protest” if you destroyed a police precinct.) It makes for a good question that should be explored of if you think Donald Trump committed insurrection against the Government of the United States on January 6th, under the same reasoning did Kshama Sawant commit insurrection against the State of Washington and/or the City of Seattle in June 2020?
Jacob Chansley — the Q-Anon Shaman — is apparently trying to run for Congress as an L in AZ. I wonder if he will be barred as well for being an “insurrectionist.”
Oh boy, let us let four judges in Colorado start telling the LP who can’t run for our presidential nomination
My understanding is that no court or government exercised 14A, S3. Davis and Lee, iirc, didn’t seek federal office post-Civil War.
It’s absurd to say J6 was an “insurrection,” and that Trump incited an “insurrection.” But even if they were, this CO SCt decision is a blatant violation of due process. Amash is 100% correct.
I agree with Justin Amash. This action by the Colorado Supreme Court is rash and a rush to inflict partisan wrath when proof of insurrection by Donald Trump has not been established in a proper court hearing and process giving Trump the opportunity for defense. I did not vote for Trump but I can see this type of action will set off a rancorous discord in the future and is improper.
The notion of insurrection with no determination that ever gets voted on or decided what is or is not is ridiculous. I can take this can of worms, spill it on the ground, and extend it to many things that leads to trampling of civil liberties for everyman because he took part in this protest 8 years ago during the George Floyd Riots where they ransacked a police precinct. And make no mistake, I hate Trump.
I agree with Darryl. Hundreds of thousands of confederates became eligible to run for any office in the U.S. when President Ulysses Grant signed the amnesty act of 1872. However, the Amnesty Act didn’t apply to people like Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee. The Act didn’t cover military generals like Lee, nor former Cabinet members and members of congress like Davis.
But it is worth noting that Davis was indicted and spent two years locked up.
Neither Jefferson Davis nor Robert E. Lee were convicted of any crimes after the failed Confederate war for Independence, but both were ineligible for the US Presidency, as were many other Confederates.