Washington DC [US]: In a major relief for Donald Trump, the US Supreme Court on Monday, allowed the former President to appear on the ballot in Colorado, CNN reported.
The top court ruling reverses the Colorado order, which disqualified Trump over his conduct around the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol.
The development follows months of debate over whether the frontrunner for the GOP nomination violated the “insurrectionist clause” included in the 14th Amendment.
The opinion is a massive victory for Trump, vanquishing one of the many legal threats that have both plagued and animated his campaign against President Joe Biden.
However, the decision has no impact on the four ongoing criminal cases that Trump is facing, including the federal election subversion case that covers some of the same conduct surrounding January 6, 2021, as reported by CNN.
The court was unanimous on the idea that Trump could not be unilaterally removed from the ballot.
But the justices were divided about how broadly the decision would sweep. A 5-4 majority said that no state could dump a federal candidate off any ballot – but four justices asserted that the court should have limited its opinion.
The former President hailed the judgement terming it a “big win” for the country.
“BIG WIN FOR AMERICA!!!” Trump wrote on social media.
But, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, the liberal group that filed the the lawsuit on behalf of Republican voters, criticized the Supreme Court ruling – but also said it was “in no way a win for Trump” because it declined to address the insurrection language from Colorado.
“The Supreme Court had the opportunity in this case to exonerate Trump, and they chose not to do so. Every court – or decision-making body – that has substantively examined the issue has determined that January 6th was an insurrection and that Donald Trump incited it. That remains true today,” the group said.
Notably, the US Supreme Court’s ruling doesn’t directly address whether Trump’s actions on January 6 qualified as an “insurrection” – skirting an issue that the courts in Colorado had wrestled with, according to CNN.
The five-justice majority – Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh – wrote that states may not remove any federal officer from the ballot, especially the president, without Congress first passing legislation.
“We conclude that States may disqualify persons holding or attempting to hold state office. But States have no power under the Constitution to enforce Section 3 with respect to federal offices, especially the Presidency,” CNN quoted the ruling.
“Nothing in the Constitution delegates to the States any power to enforce Section 3 against federal officeholders and candidates,” it added.
But, four of the justices disagreed on the scope of the decision.
With its opinion, the majority, “shuts the door on other potential means of federal enforcement,” Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote in a concurring opinion. “We cannot join an opinion that decides momentous and difficult issues unnecessarily.”
Justice Amy Coney Barrett, writing alone in a concurring opinion, said that the case “does not require us to address the complicated question whether federal legislation is the exclusive vehicle through which Section 3 can be enforced.”
