A top legal expert predicts the U.S. Supreme Court will uphold Tuesday evening’s Colorado Supreme Court’s groundbreaking decision that Donald Trump violated the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by engaging in insurrection and is disqualified from holding public office, including the presidency. As a result, the court ruled, he is disqualified from the Colorado ballot.
Neal Katyal, the well-known former Acting Solicitor General of the United States who is now a Professor of National Security Law at Georgetown University Law Center, said on MSNBC the conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court have little choice but to apply their “textualism” method of reading the Constitution to the Colorado case. Textualism requires the text of the Constitution to be not interpreted but applied via a plain reading of the words on the document.
If they do, Katyal said, “Trump will be disqualified from the ballot.”
Section Three of the 14th Amendment reads: “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office…who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States…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.” (Abbreviated, full version here.)
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Katyal is no stranger to the U.S. Supreme Court, In 2017 he broke “the record held by Thurgood Marshall for the minority lawyer with the most oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court.”
MSNBC’s Katie Phang told viewers, “the Colorado Supreme Court has ruled that Donald Trump has been disqualified from being included on the GOP primary ballot going into 2024.”
Calling the Colorado ruling a “predictable decision,” he noted that “section three bars insurrectionists from holding public office, that’s part of our Constitution, just like you’ve got to be 35 in order to be president or a natural born citizen.”
“And what the Colorado Supreme Court did today is just read that provision for what it means, which is, if you’re engaged in insurrection, you can’t run for president.”
Noting the court stayed its own decision, knowing it would be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, Katyal called the 217 page ruling “incredibly persuasive reasoning.” He predicted, “what’s going to happen now is the United States Supreme Court will be asked to hear this case, they will undoubtedly hear the case and make a ruling and that will cover all 50 states, but for now, Donald Trump is not allowed to run in Colorado.”
He also observed the ruling “follows pretty much directly from the text of the Constitution. So you know, someone like Donald Trump who claims to be a strict textualist when it comes to the Constitution has been hoisted on his own petard.”
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Phang asked, “do you think then, if they’re intellectually honest, that the members of SCOTUS will not only take up this case, but would be forced to follow the text of section three of the 14th amendment and affirm the decision to not let Donald Trump be on a ballot?”
“I do,” Katyal definitively replied. “When it comes to Donald Trump, it’s important to remember this is the court that ruled against him many times in the 2020 election.”
“It’s the court that ruled against his executive privilege claims over the January 6 committee in an eight-to-one decision last year.”
“So, you know, I think that a fair-minded reading of this provision really compels this result.”
The Colorado Supreme Court, he added, “took pains to say, you know – this is just a quote from the opinion – ‘we’re mindful in 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.’ And I think that the United States Supreme Court would apply that same standard. Trump will be disqualified from the ballot.”
Image: Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour