On Tuesday, Dec. 19, the Colorado State Supreme Court voted in a 4-3 ruling to disqualify Donald J. Trump from the ballot citing Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. It’s likely to go all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court first thing after the new year. But at the same time, California is wrestling with an issue to keep him off the March 2024 primary ballot. State officials have until Dec. 28 to make a decision and so far it doesn’t look that way.
But it very could likely. I think some states have been worried about being the first one to actually go through with it fully. But now, that Colorado has done this, it could lead for others states to easily follow through. On Nov. 7, 2020, once Georgia reported that the state had turned blue with Biden winning, Arizona and Michigan followed through with the election results projecting him as the eventual winner.
Now, Trump’s legal team has been arguing that all he was doing was exercising his First Amendment rights. He can’t help that a bunch of other people “misunderstood” what he meant. That’s the legal stragety. It’s like how the tobacco industry spent years denying they were making their products addictive. We’re just putting out a product. What someone does with it is totally on them.
However, Trump’s own words spoken during a September 2020 new conference may come back to hurt him. When asked if he was going to have a peaceful transfer of power, Trump’s own words were “We’re going to have to see what happens.” Now, if absolutely nothing had happened between this statement and Biden’s inauguration, one person could interpret that comment as basically “We’re going to have to see what the election result are. And if I’m not the winner, I’ll work with Biden and his team.”
But that’s too tame and eloquent for someone as Trump to say. Of course, he was there at the Jan. 6 rally building up the crowd. If he had avoided the rally, he could’ve used plausible deniability as his defense. If you say something like, “I can’t stand that person and I wish they were dead.” Then, less than four months later, you meet with some people who are later convicted of killing someone, you don’t have to be Hercule Poirot to put two and two together. His legal team could always say the “see what happens” is refering to the election results if he isn’t the winner.
Another question that is still hard to defend is why the hell did Trump not notify the Washington, D.C. National Guard. As I reported in a previous post. When the Chicago White Sox held Disco Demolition Night in 1979, the Chicago police showed up at Cormiskey Park within about half an hour to quell the rioters on the field. Trump didn’t make one single call. It was then-Vice President Mike Pence who ordered the National Guard.
And of course, his legal team will argue Trump was under the protection of the Secret Service so he couldn’t make the necessary call. However, this brings into question the effectiveness of the Agency if they couldn’t get Trump to a secure location as fast as possible to make a phone call. I’m sure during 9/11, President George H.W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney had access to phones even in the olden days of 2001 to make the necessary calls available. But Trump is always about passing the blame to someone else when something goes wrong. He even said this in November of last year that he should get all the credit but none of the blame.
If the insurrection coup attempt had been successful, he would’ve wanted the credit. But since it wasn’t, he doesn’t want any of the blame. You all know good and well, he would’ve been talking about it non-stop. He would’ve been talking about how he help lead “patriots” and “true Americans” in “retaking” America. He also help stoke for about two months telling people the election was rigged. This is like screaming “fire” in a crowded room or area to cause damage.
Colorado only has 10 Electoral votes. California has 54. That’s 64 Electoral votes that could keep Trump from a second Presidency. If a candidate isn’t qualified for a position they shouldn’t be allowed on a ballot. If they’ve done some things in their past that are criminal or shady, they shouldn’t be allowed on the ballot. It’s been said that Herschel Walker actually lived in Texas when he tried to run for the U.S. Senate in Georgia. When Marjorie Taylor Greene couldn’t win in one Congressional district, she “moved” to another district. Alan Keyes, a Republican from Maryland was drafted by the Illinois Republican Party to run against Barack Obama for the U.S. Senate race in 2004. He had also been critical of when Hillary Clinton ran for the U.S. Senate for New York state in 2000. But the state’s laws said that as long as someone wakes up on the day of the election at a place in New York State, they are a legal resident.
But usually, when it comes to residency or criminal activities, it’s pretty cut and dry. Keeping Trump off the ballots is what all states should be doing. If the roles were reversed, they definitely would be calling to do whatever they could to get a Democrat off the ballot. And there’s the irony. If given the opportunity to keep Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton or any other Democrat or non-Republican off the ballot, many more conservative states would push it through in no time.
The whole basis of Project 2025 is going after political opponents even proactively. Trump has said that he is going to be an authoritative power. And there are still people who are defending his comments as jokes or exaggerations. It’s the same thing like the meme: “Trump didn’t say that. And if he did say that, he didn’t mean it. And if he did mean it, you just didn’t understand it. And if you did understand it, it doesn’t matter, because others have said worse.” The last time I checked, no former Democrat or Republican Presidential candidate prior to 2020 talked about being a dictator. Richard M. Nixon and Ronald Reagan might have been hardcore racists, but they knew they couldn’t piss off everyone.
I mean a lot of people thought Obama was a tyrannical dictator but that just means they didn’t like him because he’s black. Seriously, if President Obama really wanted to do a lot of what people said he would do, he would’ve done them during the eight years he was in office. And while Trump talks about the border security, he had a full four years to do it himself.
This puts the SCOTUS on the hot seat to determine the power of state’s rights. That’s all conservatives talk about. I mean that was the argument about repealing Roe v. Wade and how it should go back to the states. And many states have passed Draconian laws to make abortion illegal. Why can’t a state choose whether or not to disqualify a candidate? The door swings both ways on these matters. If one state doesn’t require you to have a permit to carry a firearm while another does, you need to respect that. What’s the purpose of states having individual laws if it only applies to sales of alcohol, tobacco and fireworks?
But ask yourself this questions – why exactly does Trump want to be re-elected? It’s not for the country. He wants to run for himself. And even some conservatives are starting to see this. Trump isn’t taking the race as serious as others do. That alone should disqualify him.
What do you think? Please comment.
Zane Says 