Former United States President Donald Trump has been disqualified from the ballot for the Maine Republican primary.
This is the second state, after Colorado, to challenge the candidacy of the former Republican president based on the “insurrectional prohibition” of the 14th Amendment, a measure that has never been used in history.
Secretary of State, Democrat Shenna Bellows, was the one who made the final decision to disqualify Trump after a group of former state legislators filed the challenge against the Republican leader.
“I do not reach this conclusion lightly,” Bellows wrote, regarding her controversial decision to eliminate Trump from the race. “Democracy is sacred … I am mindful that no Secretary of State has ever deprived a presidential candidate of ballot access based on Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment. I am also mindful, however, that no presidential candidate has ever before engaged in insurrection.”
New blow to democracy: Trump disqualified from Maine Republican primary by emmanuel.rondon on Scribd
Unlike Colorado and Michigan, the ballot eligibility process in Maine is first deliberated by the Secretary of State, not the courts.
The actions taken by the Colorado State Supreme Court and the Maine Secretary of State are now in question. The most important voices in the Republican Party, practically in unison, questioned the impeachment against Trump, and many legal experts consider the measure misplaced.
Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows has decided to add her name to the ignoble list of Democratic officials claiming to defend democracy by preventing its exercise for millions of Trump supporters. Here is the decision...https://t.co/ENZUrybA6i
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) December 29, 2023
Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold assured this Thursday, before Bellows’ decision, that former President Trump will temporarily return to the state ballot.
Griswold said the former president will run in the Republican primary unless the U.S. Supreme Court takes up the case and upholds the lower court’s ruling or refuses to take up the appeal filed by the Colorado Republican Party.
The Maine Secretary of State’s decision is also expected to be appealed and reach the Supreme Court.
Before the actions taken in Colorado and Maine, several other states, including Michigan and Minnesota, rejected similar efforts to disqualify Trump.
The Trump campaign also spoke out about the new effort to eliminate Trump from the race.
“We are witnessing, in real-time, the attempted theft of an election and the disenfranchisement of the American voter. Democrats in blue states are recklessly and un-Constitutionally suspending the civil rights of the American voters by attempting to summarily remove President Trump’s name from the ballot,” said Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung.
Trump Campaign Statement on Maine Secretary of State Ruling pic.twitter.com/0ZmNeKDTpR
— Team Trump (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TeamTrump) December 29, 2023
