Colorado Supreme Court orders Trump off 2024 ballot in 4-3 decision
'Special Report' All-Star panelists offer legal insight into the 14th Amendment challenge in Colorado.
Trump's competitors for the GOP nomination rallied around the former president on Tuesday evening after the Colorado Supreme Court removed him from the state's 2024 ballot.
Though they want to defeat Trump at the ballot box, the former president's rivals for the Republican presidential nomination don't want him to be knocked off the ballot.
The divided court ruled that Trump is ineligible to run for the presidency under the U.S. Constitution's insurrection clause, arguing that his actions fueled the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by right-wing protesters aiming to disrupt congressional certification of President Biden's 2020 election victory.
TRUMP CAMPAIGN BLASTS COLORADO SUPREME COURT RULING KNOCKING HIM OFF THAT STATE'S BALLOT
Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump attends a campaign event in Waterloo, Iowa, on Dec. 19. (REUTERS/Scott Morgan)
The ruling came as Trump and three of his rivals – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former ambassador to the United Nations and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, and multi-millionaire biotech entrepreneur and first-time candidate Vivek Ramaswamy – campaigned in Iowa with just under four weeks to go until the state's caucuses lead off the GOP presidential nominating calendar.
"The Left invokes ‘democracy’ to justify its use of power, even if it means abusing judicial power to remove a candidate from the ballot based on spurious legal grounds. SCOTUS should reverse," DeSantis wrote in a social media posting as he attacked what he viewed as judicial overreach.
WHAT CRITICS ARE SAYING ABOUT THE COLORADO HIGH COURT'S RULING
Haley told reporters that "we don't need to have judges making these decisions. We need voters to make these decisions. So I want to see this in the hands of the voters. We're going to win this the right way."
Ramaswamy, who is Trump's biggest defender in the winnowed down field of remaining rivals for the nomination, vowed to withdraw his name from the Colorado primary ballot and encouraged his opponents to do the same.
"This is what an *actual* attack on democracy looks like: in an un-American, unconstitutional, and *unprecedented* decision, a cabal of Democrat judges are barring Trump from the ballot in Colorado," he charged. "Having tried every trick in the book to eliminate President Trump from running in this election, the bipartisan Establishment is now deploying a new tactic to bar him from ever holding office again."
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy stand at their podiums ahead of the fourth Republican candidates' debate in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, on Dec. 6. (REUTERS/Alyssa Pointer)
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Trump's most vocal opponent in the GOP presidential nomination field, was campaigning in New Hampshire on Tuesday. The Granite State holds the first primary and second overall contest after Iowa in the Republican calendar.
Christie termed the Colorado ruling as "probably premature" because the former president has yet to be tried for inciting the attack on the Capitol.
"I do not believe Donald Trump should be prevented from being President of the United States by any court. I think he should be prevented from being President of the United States by the voters of this country," Christie emphasized.
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Trump is the commanding front-runner for the Republican nomination as he runs for the presidency a third straight time.
Trump made history earlier this year as the first former or current president to be indicted for a crime, but his four indictments — including in federal court in Washington, D.C., and in Fulton County court in Georgia on charges he tried to overturn his 2020 presidential election loss — have only fueled his support among Republican voters.
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a long-shot for the GOP nomination, was more critical than his higher polling rivals as he reacted to the news from Colorado.
"It should come as no real surprise to anyone that a state supreme court has disqualified Donald Trump from the presidential ballot in 2024. As I stated at the time, Mr. Trump’s actions leading up to the events of January 6th, and his lack of action as the Capitol building was breached, disqualify him from ever holding public office again," Hutchinson emphasized in a statement.
And he stressed that "the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling only serves to reiterate that it is time for the Republican Party to move forward with new leadership, dedicated to truth, decency, and conservative principles."
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