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Maine court declines to rule in Trump ballot case before US Supreme Court [1]

['Emma Davis', 'More From Author', '- January']

Date: 2024-01-18  

The Maine Superior Court declined to rule on the appeal of Secretary of State Shenna Bellows’ earlier decision to disqualify former President Donald Trump from the Republican primary ballot.

In a decision filed on Wednesday, Judge Michaela Murphy returned the question of Trump’s eligibility to Bellows, ordering her to issue a new ruling after the U.S. Supreme Court decides on a similar case out of Colorado.

Bellows, a Democrat, disqualified Trump from Maine’s presidential primary ballot last month because of his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol under the Constitution’s “insurrection clause” making Maine the second state to do so after Colorado.

Both Bellows and the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that Trump was ineligible for the primary ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which prohibits those who took an oath to uphold the Constitution and then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” from holding office again.

The Colorado decision has since been taken up by the U.S. Supreme Court. Oral arguments for that case are scheduled for Feb. 8.

While it is not unprecedented for secretary of states to remove candidates from their state ballots, Bellows is the first to bar a candidate from ballot access under the 14th Amendment, a decision she has since received criticism and threats over. Republican state representatives also attempted to impeach her at the start of the legislative session earlier this month, a move that failed in a mostly party-line 60-80 vote.

Bellows is reviewing the decision and declined to comment at this time.

Breaking down the Superior Court decision

Throughout briefs filed in the Maine Superior Court in Kennebec County this month, Trump’s counsel argued that Maine election law was not designed to resolve complex constitutional questions and that Bellows should have recused herself because of bias.

The ballot challenge process in Maine is distinct from other states in requiring a ruling by the secretary of state before being heard in court. However, Bellows had stayed her Dec. 28 decision to disqualify Trump pending appeal, ultimately leaving the ruling up to the courts.

The Superior Court has placed the decision back in her hands, however.

This story was published earlier by the Maine Morning Star, an affiliate of the nonprofit States Newsroom network, which includes the Florida Phoenix.

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[1] Url: https://floridaphoenix.com/2024/01/18/maine-court-declines-to-rule-in-trump-ballot-case-before-us-supreme-court/

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