Winning – MAGA edition: Supreme Court rules states can’t kick Trump off the ballot
The decision swiftly ended the legal fight over whether states could bar Trump from their ballots based on the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday handed a sweeping win to former President Donald Trump by ruling that states cannot kick him off the ballot over his actions leading up to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — bringing a swift end to a case with huge implications for the 2024 election.
In an unsigned ruling with no dissents, the court reversed the Colorado Supreme Court, which determined that Trump could not serve again as president under Section 3 of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.
The provision prohibits those who previously held government positions but later “engaged in insurrection” from running for various offices.
The court said the Colorado Supreme Court had wrongly assumed that states can determine whether a presidential candidate or other candidate for federal office is ineligible.
The ruling makes it clear that Congress, not states, has to set rules on how the 14th Amendment provision can be enforced against federal office-seekers. As such, the decision applies to all states, not just Colorado. States retain the power to bar people running for state office from appearing on the ballot under Section 3.
By deciding the case on that legal question, the court avoided any analysis or determination of whether Trump’s actions constituted an insurrection.
The decision comes just a day before the Colorado primary.
Minutes after the ruling, Trump hailed the decision in an all-capital-letters post on his social media site, writing, “Big win for America!!!”
