The US Supreme Court handed Donald Trump a major victory on Monday as he campaigns to regain the presidency, overturning a judicial decision that had excluded him from Colorado's ballot under a constitutional provision involving insurrection for inciting and supporting the January 6, 2021, Capitol attack.
According to the majority ruling: "States have no power under the Constitution" to implement the clause barring someone from holding federal office — "especially the presidency" — if they participated in insurrection. Governments may use those grounds to bar someone from holding state office, as per CNBC.
It was not surprising that the decision was made in favour of Trump, meaning that whatever votes he receives in Tuesday's ballot will count for the former president.
Many of the court's nine justices seemed dubious of the Colorado Supreme Court's justification and procedure for removing Trump from the ballot during the case's oral arguments on February 8.
A lawyer representing the six Colorado voters who wanted Trump to be disqualified was addressed during the hearing by Justice Elena Kagan, one of the court's most progressive members. "I think that the question that you have to confront is why a single state should decide who gets to be president of the United States," she said.
After Colorado barred Trump from the ballot, two other states, Maine and Illinois, did the same.
But those decisions are on hold pending appeals by Trump, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination.
All three states’ decisions to block Trump from their ballots were based on an interpretation of Section 3 of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.
The former president Donald Trump welcomed the Supreme Court's decision to keep him on the Colorado ballot. “BIG WIN FOR AMERICA!!!”, he said.
He is anticipated to respond to the decision with statements at Mar-a-Lago shortly, according to CNN.
The decision has already resulted in contributions to his campaign. In less than 60 minutes following the court's judgement, the Trump campaign sent out a fundraising SMS to supporters informing them of the outcome and denouncing "the insane Democratic scheme to remove my name."
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