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Trump Likely to Win Supreme Court Disqualification Case: Legal Experts
Justices on the U.S. Supreme Court appear prepared to hand Donald Trump a win, allowing him to not only stay on the Colorado primary ballot, but to make a landmark ruling that the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution does not allow any state to remove a candidate from an election even if they have engaged in insurrection, according to several legal experts.
Legal experts also suggest the justices were not open to Colorado’s argument, and are likely to decide for the ex-president who is also facing 91 criminal felony charges, including some for his efforts in allegedly attempting to overturn the 2020 election he lost.
“This argument did not go well for the Trump challengers,” said former Acting U.S. Solicitor General Neal Katyal live on MSNBC.
“The SCOTUS oral argument- Colorado will lose, with the only issue being whether a single Justice will dissent. Tough and smart questions by the Justices including the 3 in the liberal wing,” writes Professor of law Andrew Weissmann, an MSNBC legal analyst who spent decades at DOJ.
“My bet,” says professor of law Steve Vladeck, “Between 7-2 and 9-0 for the very specific proposition that states can’t unilaterally disqualify candidates running for President on the ground that they engaged in insurrection. That’s just a prediction based on the oral argument—not what I think the Court *ought* to do.”
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Professor of law Rick Hasan, a noted election law expert, says it “would not be surprising to see a quick 9-0 or 8-1 ruling reversing Colorado and keeping Trump on the ballot, with Roberts writing on the federal interest, and perhaps some concurrences (Kavanaugh on Griffin, Alito and Gorsuch on ‘holdin’ office). Sotomayor is the question mark.”
“In my view this argument is as good as over,” wrote Mark Joseph Stern, before oral arguments concluded. “A majority will hold that individual states can’t enforce Sec. 3 against the president, at least without congressional approval.”
As some observed, it took the Justices an hour to even address the issue of insurrection, which is central to the case. Others expired grave concern that Justice Clarence Thomas, who they say clearly has a deep conflict of interest given his spouse’s actions, chose to not recuse himself.
“SCOTUS justices across the aisle — including Kagan, Thomas, and Barrett — have questioned states’ ability to disqualify federal candidates under the 14th Amendment, Section 3,” notes veteran legal reporter Adam Klasfeld. He also says, “Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson expresses skepticism about the definition of ‘officer’ in the disqualification clause: ‘Why didn’t they put president in the very enumerated list of Section Three?'”
“That ‘troubles’ her, she says.”
Justice Brett Kavanaugh suggested that criminal prosecution of insurrection was required to enforce Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. He also asked about “the right of the people” to vote for the candidate of their choice, and appeared concerned about “disenfranchisement” of voters.
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The Associated Press observes it is “bad for the plaintiffs trying to disqualify Trump” that January 6 “isn’t coming up in this argument.”
The AP adds that “the questioning has almost all been about technical, procedural issues, which are many of the reasons that Trump and others say the high court just shouldn’t go there. The justices are plainly worried that they’ll open a Pandora’s Box if they uphold the Colorado ruling, allowing other states to disqualify people they dislike through whatever fact-finding procedures they see fit to use.”
The attorney arguing for Colorado, Jason Murray, “keeps trying to bring the discussion back to Trump’s conduct, but not even the Democratic-appointed justices seem to be biting.”
Politico is even more certain that the Supreme Court will side with Trump and deem him not ineligible to hold elected office.
“The Supreme Court appeared to sharply veer against the Colorado voters challenging former President Donald Trump’s eligibility to run for office,” Politico’s Kyle Cheney reports. “Justices on both the left and right raised pointed questions to Jason Murray…about the ‘extraordinary’ ramifications of letting individual states decide whether a candidate is an insurrectionist.”
He adds that the “justices seem hostile to [the] disqualification effort.”
“Chief Justice John Roberts said that would essentially empower individual states to exert unilateral control over federal elections, a position ‘at war’ with the notion that the Constitution’s 14th Amendment was intended to empower the federal government to constrain wayward states.”
Justice Elena Kagan also appeared opposed, asking: “Why should a single state have the ability to make this determination, not only for their own citizens, but for the rest of the nation?”
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
