Exactly. Biden's best and perhaps only chance is to run against Trump. If it was truly about Biden winning and only that, then I would want to make sure Trump was the nominee. I would not want him DQd. If it was about America which the Democrats and liberals demonstrably love more than the GOP, then I'd be okay with courts finding Trump was not eligible to be president. It would be the same as a 10 year old not being eligible. He would have to meet the requirements and if Section 3 of the 14th means he doesn't meet the requirements, then he should be ineligible.
Often see people praise the vagueness of the Constitution as open and not overly prescriptive, but I think it's pretty lousy, honestly, in its vagueness. A section that defines terms would have been great. Part of the article I linked talks about language drift between the original Constitution's use of the word 'officer' and what it meant to Congressmen a few generations later in 1868. I get the feeling, somewhat persuaded by that article, that in this amendment they thought of 'officers' as those who have their jobs by appointment, not election. Thinking more expansively on that interpretation, it would also mean someone like Derrick Evans -- who was in the West Virginia legislature (so he swore an oath) when he participated in Jan 6 and later pled guilty to felony civil disorder -- could not become a West Virginia Senator at the national level, nor could he be appointed by the governor to be, say, the West Virginia Education Commissioner, but he could run and serve as West Virginia Governor or he could return to the West Virginia House of Delegates. Is that sensible? Not really, but it all hinges on what "officer" means.
I think you make a good point here. Challenging his eligibility looks like the first step into another constitutional crisis if he wins the election. I'm still not believing he'll beat Biden in the general, but if he did then denying him the office will be very traumatic and maybe not possible. Maybe people think it can be avoided by making sure he's not on the ballot in this first place, but that's a political firestorm too. I might be joining you in voting for Haley. Don't like her at all, but we'll see who the second most popular candidate is when Texas gets its turn in the primary.
This is why many amendments include language empowering Congress to pass legislation to enforce the amendment. Section 5 of the 14th amendment states that "The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article." Congress could pass a law tomorrow defining that the president is an officer of the US and we'd be done with this. I think past authors of amendments have recognized that they can't forsee all of the applications and statutory weakenesses of an amendment so many modern amendments include the clause empowering Congress to pass laws to enforce the amendment. That clause is why the Civil Rights Act is constitutional and that clause in the 15th amendment gives the Voting Rights Act its constitutionality. But we have a dysfunctional Congress so we'll resort to arbitrary and unnecessary judicial fights to define it.
I don't think the founding fathers ever thought a criminal like trump would be a leading candidate for the presidency from any party, but here we are.
Haley polls about 10% plus or minus nationally. Even in a more moderate state like New Hampshire she is 20% behind trump. My guess is that haley has about as much chance of getting my vote as getting basso's vote. As long as trump is running, he will get the republican nomination driven by maga support from voters like basso, commodore etc...
Quoted for truth. Well, sure. But, I've already decided I'm voting for the leading non-Trump candidate in the republican primary when it comes to Texas. I know it won't make a difference, but neither does any other individual primary voter.
Yea, sure, you voted for someone in a pro-socialist party. If you are going to pretend, at least google the candidate and their party first.
The One Man Crime Wave's lawyer have argued in front of the Colorado Supreme Court that Trump was not an officer of the US and that Trump never took no oath. The lawyers might have a better plea in saying that Trump is too effing stupid to understand any of this. But hey, if Trump really supported the Constitution he would have tweeted it yet did not.
I agree with Trump's lawyer on Jefferson Davis. He actually doesn't seem to have any theory about a third Obama term, and he reacted to the question like he didn't see how it was relevant.
[The Atlantic] The Colorado Ruling Calls the Originalists’ Bluff The disqualification of Donald Trump challenges the Supreme Court’s conservatives to follow through on their stated beliefs. By Adam Serwer The Colorado Supreme Court has left the justices of the United States Supreme Court in the very uncomfortable position of having to prove that they have the courage of their stated convictions. Yesterday, Colorado’s high court ruled in a 4–3 decision that former President Donald Trump, because of his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, is disqualified from appearing on the ballot in Colorado, based on Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The language of that section, written in the aftermath of the Civil War to disqualify former Confederates who had taken up arms against the United States in defense of the institution of human bondage, is short and simple: No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, 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, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. There is no language limiting the power of the section to former Confederates, however, and its scope is sweeping, with no requirement that those engaged in the specified conduct be convicted. Indeed, given the number of people who served in the Confederate army and governments, such a requirement would have been impractical. The Colorado court weighed all of this in arriving at its decision. “We do not reach these conclusions lightly. We are mindful of the magnitude and weight of the questions now before us,” the justices in the majority wrote. “We are likewise mindful of our solemn duty to apply the law, without fear or favor, and without being swayed by public reaction to the decisions that the law mandates we reach.”
None of the dissenting opinions from the Colorado court argued against the applicability of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the POTUS. Jefferson Davis is a really poor example. He was completely disqualified from running for office again. He was never the POTUS, but he was a United States representative and United States senator before he left the union. When he left the union, he was no longer a citizen of the US, and his lawyers have argued that way in a trial after the civil war. He was to be tried for rebellion until he was pardoned by the Andrew Johnson in 1868, but he was not given full citizen rights (I don't think he even had the right to vote) until 1978 when the US Congress posthumously granted him full citizen rights. Clearly, the United States of that time (right after the civil war) would never have allowed him to hold any offices of the United States after the war, and he knew that. There were no carve-outs for the POTUS in Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. If they wanted to do that, they would have specifically stated so. However, it did allow Congress, by a 2/3 vote, to remove this disability if, for any reason, the American people, through their voice, wanted to do so. If Trump's insurrection is deemed no big deal and the American people want him back, they can persuade Congress to remove the disability. Democracy is alive.
because the dissenting opionions are so weak that, should the case get to the USSC , it will not rule against the CO supreme court decision.
