After Colorado readmitted Donald Trump in the state's Republican primary, Maine announced that the former president would not be able to compete in the state. Unlike the first case, it was not the courts that made the decision, but the local government, which concluded that the Republican had been part of an "insurrection" on January 6, 2021, so he was not qualified to hold public office again.
The decision was criticized by many Republicans and now also by Tulsi Gabbard, a former presidential candidate who formally left the Democratic Party at the end of 2022 to become an independent.
In dialogue with Fox News, she assured that it is simply the "M.O. of the Democrat elite," who "will stop at nothing to try to maintain their power, even if it means taking away the right to vote of Americans."
"So they have no problem removing Trump from the polls. They have no problem going after him and persecuting him through an armed and politicized Department of Justice. They have no qualms about doing whatever they deem necessary to cling to power," the former congresswoman continued.
Tulsi Gabbard responds to Trump being thrown off the Maine ballot:
"If you're a Democrat or Republican, now is the time that we as Americans must stand up for our democratic process in this country." pic.twitter.com/PbE0okI1NG
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) December 29, 2023
Finally, Gabbard, who based much of her presidential campaign on an anti-interventionist foreign policy, also criticized the Republican establishment.
"It's ridiculous that we are having this conversation here in the United States of America. … We've seen how the war hawks in Washington, they will see this happen in another country and they'll be very quick to say we must go and intervene. We must go and topple this banana republic or this dictatorship. Many of these very same people are the people who are driving this. And it's not just Democrats. They're Republicans who are threatened by President Trump's unwillingness to buy into their establishment ways," she added.
Trump off the ballot in Maine
Local Secretary of State Shenna Bellows (D) announced her decision late Thursday, based on the 14th Amendment. "I do not come to this conclusion lightly," she wrote regarding her controversial decision to eliminate Trump from the race.
"Democracy is sacred… I am aware that no Secretary of State has ever deprived a presidential candidate of access to the polls based on Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment. However, I am also aware that no presidential candidate has ever participated in an insurrection," she added.
Unlike the cases in Colorado and Michigan, the ballot eligibility process in Maine is first deliberated by the Secretary of State, not the courts.
What does the 14th Amendment say?
Specifically, it is the third section of the Amendment that judges and officials are using against Trump's candidacy, who is currently leading in the Republican primaries.
"No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, 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. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability," that point states.
