Colorado GOP Threatens to Go Rogue If Trump Decision Stands
Colorado GOP Threatens to Go Rogue If Trump Decision Stands
The Colorado Department of State warned that it would be “a matter for the Courts” if the state’s Republican party withdrew from or ignored the results of the primary.
Remember when people who employed fascist rhetoric, incited riots at Capitols, tried to destroy democracy and kill a sitting Vice President were considered terrorists by everyone and weren't to be negotiated with?
Pepperidge Farms does.
The comments in conservative communities are saying “democrats” are fascists and blaming them for shit conservatives did in the past prior to the voting rights act.
Basically flaunting their ignorance of history and the southern strategy while intentionally muddying the waters with projection. It’s gross
Pepperidge Farms does.
Doubtful. They're probably back to donating money to fascists for a 1% lower tax rate.
What does that mean, they’ll have their own election with blackjack and hookers?
Don't say black in the presence of GOPers.
They're just going to take their burning cross and go home.
Plot Twist: They've already gone rogue. Right now they're just bullying to get what they want.
They can just go fuck themselves. 🖕
Right? Every threat was something they're already doing.
And from 2000-2015, democrats have been bending over.
I'm glad they're starting to recognize the BS.
I wonder what a rogue GOP looks like if that isn't what we have been looking at all our lifes....
Do you think a rogue GOP would storm the capital even more?
But this time, they mean it!
Dave Williams, the chairman of the state party, reaffirmed the plan. “I’m not going to let these sons of bitches dictate who we’re going to nominate,”
Where was Dave on January 6th?
Pretty sure anyone giving comfort to Trump on this matter now is giving comfort to an insurrectionist. Time to clean house.
The goddamn constitution is the one dictating
do it then. no one's afraid of you. y'all threaten a civil war every time the waiter forgets your ranch. we're done capitulating to threats. do it or shut the fuck up.
sounds like threats from terrorists
.. The, "terrorists" From an England perspective, are the Democrats removing a presidential candidate over empty nothings. He hasn't been actually convicted and yet, this is happening.
Slippery slope, etc. etc.
They're following the specific language of the 14th amendment. That's terrorism now? It actually doesn't say he needs to be convicted of any insurrection -- it says that he needs to have participated in an insurrection. And, it provides a specific check and balance (two-thirds vote in congress) if a court is attempting to keep him off the ballot improperly.
It sounds like we have a difference of factual understanding of what happened on January 6th. Where are you getting "empty nothings"? I saw this is why I'm saying it wasn't nothing.
A judge did say he was an insurrectionist.
Maybe you need to go read the 14th amendment and also the rulings.
The legal process was followed. The courts decided. Don't like it? Tough shit.
I didn't like it when the SCOTUS said to stop counting and give the election to Bush.
That's not an England perspective. It's a moron perspective. I'm betting there are quite a few people in England who are at least a little less idiotic.
Nice concern trolling, lmao.
From an Australian perspective, yeah, nah.
The Colorado Supreme Court is 'the Democrats' now?
.
Colorado has literally done exactly this before to keep a non-natural born citizen off the ballot, and none other than Judge Gorsuch decided that case. In his ruling he wrote that the state has a right to conduct their elections in a way to ensure their stability and in accordance with their laws. Thomas ruled the same way in Bish v Gore, and the SC ruled the same way while overturning key provisions in the Voting Rights Act.
I wonder what the difference is this time that would make conservatives do a full reverse and say states cannot control their own elections?
Are you from England?
If it was nothing how come people went to Jail for Insurrection?
How dumb can you be
He doesn't need to be convicted
Dave Williams, the chairman of the state party, reaffirmed the plan. “I’m not going to let these sons of bitches dictate who we’re going to nominate,” he said
So eloquently put by the chairman of the party of Christian family values.
Well, they can do their caucus thing as they like. As long as Trump will not appear on the ballot, I'm fine with it.
The courts decision is a bit wonky, though. I don't consider "being the candidate for party X" an "office, civil or military, of the United States", so banning him from the primaries is (IMHO) unwarranted. On the other hand, the court admits that Trumps actions are valid reasons to invoke A14, so removing him from the ballot papers for November would be justified. And that is the only place that counts.
Luckily for you, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch already ruled on that precise topic when he was a Colorado judge. A foreign born man who had become a US citizen, a person who is ineligible by default, still insisted he should have the right to run for president even if he can't take office.
Gorsuch ruled that the state had a responsibility to prevent anyone who is ineligible for office from even being allowed on the ballot.
His decision was even cited in Trumps ruling.
And that makes sense. If a person can't legally hold the office, it's letting people waste their votes by allowing that person to remain on the ballot.
You might argue that people should know all about who they're voting for, but we all know that's not the case.
He didn't actually rule on this. There was no question of eligibility in that case, it was just whether being ineligible for the position gave the state the right to block him from the ballot. This one will hinge on whether or not the amendment applies to trump. And based on the wording of the amendment, unfortunately, they have multiple ways to reasonably argue it does not, and we all know the conservative majority will rule he is eligible.
If by the 14th he is not eligible for the presidency outside of 2/3rds of Congress voting to waive that, then why the fuck should he be on the ballot? It’s pointless.
That’s like saying I’m banned from a venue but keeping me from getting in line to enter is unfair and unwarranted.
Do you hear yourself? I guess you think you know better than the high courts lmao
If there's one good thing to have come from Trump, it is that he has exposed how terrible at making laws, the politicians have been
why the fuck should he be on the ballot?
Because the Republicans should be able to do whatever they want in their candidate selection process, all the way up to and including running a disqualified candidate. It's their club and they can run it however they like.
Remember Jan 6th? That was their attempt at a civil war. We believe them, we just don't give a damn because they're like that anyway.
I love that instead of doing any type of introspection about letting someone that has been channeling Hitler in his campaign rails, and tried to overthrow the US government to remain in power represent your political party, they just want to change the rules basically making the choice for the voters that might want a real candidate.
They WANT the strongman in power. That's the point. They're terrible people who want to do terrible things.
Just seems at this point no matter your drive for bad intentions you would see Trump is poison for anyone in his orbit. Bill Barr (somehow ) and his Generals (that had to stop him from launching missiles into Mexico) seem to be the only ones that held any top positions without being part of an investigation of some sort. The party is full of terrible people, seems like it would be easier to find a Hitler nobody knows/suspects like they did in Congress.
Good luck? He's still not going to be on the ballot or eligible for a write in campaign.
You're setting yourself up to be sorely disappointed when the scotus rules that he is eligible and they can't remove him from the ballot, and the argument will be completely reasonable based on the he stupid wording of the amendment.
Oh? So you buy that line that the President is not an officer of the government?
Unlikely.
So are we just downvoting things we don't want to hear now?
As a non-US citizen I'm curious to know the arguments for both sides...just sticking my fingers in my ears and singing "la la la can't hear you" ain't gonna change the result...no matter which way it goes.
So, for the curious, why is this reply wrong? Do we think a republican weighted Scotus that overturned Roe v Wade would allow their sponsor to get ruled out of the election?
Go ahead, lol. Vote for someone who can't be president.
Colorado GOP: removes trump from ballot. Also Colorado GOP: rages that trump was removed from ballot.
“snowflake” doesn’t even begin to describe the level of self-flagellation the GOP have for themselves.
seek therapy, GOP.
If they try to still put him on the ballot, Colorado should treat it as if he isn't on there and announce the second place Republican as the winner for the state's primary.
The republicans literally can’t put him on the ballot. They don’t print the ballots.
Oh, I'm sure they'd still try something incredibly dumb.
They'll just tell people to write Trump in.
Tldr..
Wtf does that even mean in context of his job position?
Honestly I'm of two minds about it.
One, faith by the electorate in the process of elections is part of democracy. I genuinely don't think it's reasonable to tell 60 million Trump supporters that those of them that live in Colorado aren't allowed to vote for the man. I get that the letter of the law is that he tried to invade the congress and kill the vice president to keep himself in power, which is a crime that in any civilized society would keep him off the ballot not to mention behind bars, but this is actually a rare instance where I think "but they'll get really mad about it" is a viable reason not to do it. Or, at least do it on a national level, since the idea of an election where certain candidates are or aren't on the ballot differently in different states is obviously undemocratic and will clearly lead to retaliation in kind by the GOP which will step us a little further towards a civil war.
Two, fuck it. They're already rogue. They tried to kill the vice president. We're in a fight for the survival of democracy in this country and it's nice to see the boundaries being pushed by the people who aren't the ones kicking out the supporting timbers.
Fuck 'em. The only thing they don't get mad about is fascism winning. A majority of Republicans already believe elections in this country are illegitimate simply because their orange messiah didn't win. We're past the point of sitting down and having a reasonable conversation.
There's a book called How Democracies Die that goes into quite a lot of detail as to how this situation has played out historically.
Basically, it's a nasty situation. The reality of life is, everyone can just get up and do whatever they want to do. A judge can decide he's a Trump supporter and stop prosecuting Trump supporters if they attack people in the streets. A general can decide he will or won't deploy the military against the citizens when the leader orders him to. The military rank and file can obey or not. A lot of "the rules" that constrain people's behavior and keep democracy running are totally made up, and there's a bad, bad problem that happens when people start to abandon the rules.
So, what do you do when the fascists are abandoning the rules? There's an obvious answer: fight back in kind. Add some seats to the supreme court. Kick Trump supporters out of congress. Have the secretary of state decide that a state where polling locations in Democratic areas didn't get enough ballots, should have gone to the Democrats. If the Republican secretaries of state have been doing the same on Trump's side, and the alternative is losing the election, then that's a pretty sensible option.
Except, it's not. As a general rule, if the non-fascist side starts abandoning the rules in kind in order to fight back against the fascist side that is abandoning the rules, then the slippery slope down towards open war accelerates by quite a lot. Generally, the two things that can save a democracy that finds itself in this situation are:
It's a little counterintuitive. But that's what the book says. Now, is kicking Trump off the ballot "breaking the rules"? I honestly don't know. Technically it's 100% legal. But a lot of things are technically legal, including Republican state legislatures turning in vote totals that don't match the will of the voters. Like I say, I'm of two minds about it, but the bottom line is it's not quite as simple as "fuck 'em I don't care." Because "fuck 'em I don't care" energy is what starts civil wars.
I'd argue commentary like yours is a greater hindrance to a reasonable conversation than the republicans are. You're capable of being rational but are willingly refusing to.
And queue the Dems throwing down votes at a someone paying them a compliment and ironically proving my point...
I get that you’re saying that it doesn’t feel fair to you, but that’s not how the law works. We might want the law to meet our sense of fair play, but there’s a ton of questions about balancing interests and precedent and so on.
The constitution itself places limitations on who can run for president. Is it fair that Arnold Schwarzenegger can’t run for office even if people want to vote for him? Maybe, but it’s illegal. Of a genius and charismatic 29 year old entrances the country with her brilliant rhetoric and would clear 90% of the popular vote and unite the nation, she also cannot become president. Is that fair to the electorate or our young genius? Maybe, maybe not. But it’s constitutional, and it’s the law.
CO law states that primary candidates must be people eligible for election to the office as judged by the state. This law has already been used to keep someone off the ballot. In a decision decided by Gorsuch himself, it was held that states have the right to make those calls.
In addition, the feds have almost always defaulted to allowing the states to decide how to conduct their elections and have stated that the feds have no constitutional authority to dictate how they conduct elections. This was how Bush v Gore was decided, along with the Boting Rights Act and other cases. Except in the case of violating something like equal protection, the feds stay out of it. Sitting members of the current court decided those cases.
So the Foinding Fathers didn’t think that just anyone should be allowed to run and the people should decide. Case law backs the idea that states can set their own rules. Trump is disqualified in the opinion of Colorado by virtue of having engaged in insurrection, and even the previous ruling, which would allow Trump on the ballot, did not challenge that finding. They just said that the law doesn’t apply to the president of the United States. It was a bad, bad ruling.
The sc can’t even grant a stay without overruling CO election law, which I believe says the ballots must be set by Jan 5, and the self-imposed stay already runs through the 4th.
Love your answer! But I'll argue one thing.
Knowing the judgment would be appealed, no matter what, the lower court found Trump guilty of insurrection as a fact. On appeal, this fact cannot be argued or tested again. It stands.
Brillant legal maneuver. She put Trump in an inescapable box. And here we are.
I get that you’re saying that it doesn’t feel fair to you, but that’s not how the law works. We might want the law to meet our sense of fair play, but there’s a ton of questions about balancing interests and precedent and so on.
Yeah. Law's not like computer code. The details of all the rules and precedent are a critical side to be aware of, but judges also have to balance the letter of the law against the obvious justice of the situation all the time. If it were just as simple as researching and following the rules to the letter, it'd be a lot simpler profession. But if you've ever been in court for any length of time you'll see (or at least my experience has been) that the judge generally has one eye always firmly fixed on what's actually the right thing to do. Surprisingly so. Exercising, well, judgement on where to draw the line -- not just throwing out the letter of the law based on "eh I don't feel like this outcome is right" but being willing to depart from the letter of the law if something clearly wrong is happening in front of you -- is one of the most critical parts of what your job is as a judge.
I'm not really experienced enough at law to come at it from any standpoint other than "what's the right thing." I'm aware that as a matter of law, she's on completely solid ground. I think though that in the actual practice of how judges are supposed to do their jobs, those two things aren't as widely separate from each other as they might seem.
"that he tried to invade the congress and kill the vice president to keep himself in power"
No. He didn't. Tonnes of us not even in your slowly becoming joke of a country, know that isn't true.
Hang Mike Pence! Hang Mike Pence!
Karl then reminded Trump that some of his supporters involved in the violent attack were calling for Pence to be killed.
“Well, the people were very angry,” Trump said.
“They said, ‘hang Mike Pence,’” Karl told Trump.
“It’s common sense, Jon. It’s common sense that you’re supposed to protect,” Trump said. “How can you, if you know a vote is fraudulent, right, how can you pass on a fraudulent vote to Congress?”
A former aide to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows told the House January 6 committee that then-President Donald Trump had suggested to Meadows he approved of the “hang Mike Pence” chants from rioters who stormed the US Capitol, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN.
Cassidy Hutchinson, the former aide, also testified that Trump complained about his then-vice president being hustled to safety while Trump supporters breached the Capitol, the sources said.
After Pence said that he did not believe he had the authority to reject Electoral College votes, Trump tweeted that “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving States a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands the truth!”
Videos from the Capitol during the riot show a man with a bullhorn, reading the tweet aloud to others in the mob. Inside, rioters swarmed the hallways and chanted, “Hang Mike Pence.”
It's common in organized crime to use vague language in order to request crimes to be committed, so that there's no literal statement "I need you my supporters to please kill the vice president for me." Nonetheless, the communication is understood by both the speaker and listener to mean that that's what he wants to be done. Usually it's actually a lot less subtle than that collection of facts. If you don't agree with my interpretation, though, how would you characterize that set of facts? What do you think was what Trump wanted his supporters to do?
Dude your post history follows US politics way too hard for anyone to believe you're not part of said country. Don't talk like you're speaking from a foreigner perspective.
My goodness, you say a lot of ignorant things.
Unfortunately, you're completely wrong about that:
"Meadows then left the dining room and informed other people nearby that Trump had signaled a positive view of the prospect of hanging the vice president, the panel heard."
I went back and checked, and you've had time to update your profile picture, but not to respond to my comment with anything factual.
I fully anticipate some kind of snarky taking-a-superior-tone response (or silence), that still isn't anything connected to factual reality or directly addressing what I said. Blah blah Sartre anti-semites
Democrats and Republicans have turned every issue into a state issue so only counts in the state that says it
Ununited States of America says if a state says so it goes even if it is against federal law been going this way for a while now
this will be just like cannabis and abortion and insurance both medical auto and otherwise notary laws work this way too if you win the geographic lottery then your state rights are this but if born over there your rights are that America nothing to do with voting some of us are not allowed to even vote because of the state's rights issues so now trump will be legal in these states and not those states and will still be on the ballot depending on your location like abortion and cannabis and insurence and certain jobs
state's rights "trump" all around here even over federal federal law is seen as a guideline by the states and is only used if it favors the state including food environmental work pay/ safety laws you name it
this ruling means nothing anywhere but Colorado and whatever states decide the same will not affect the federal guidelines just like everything else
demopublicans are already rogue and do whatever they please already with no thought to how the citizens vote or feel on matters
demopublicans are already rogue and do whatever they please already with no thought to how the citizens vote or feel on matters
You going to provide any evidence to back up this claim?
https://truthout.org/articles/12-journalists-arrested-44-assaulted-across-the-us-this-year/
the list goes on and on for both parties
They seem to be rather missing the point. It wouldn't matter if they switch to a caucus, he's banned from running in the state so all they would do is exclude Republicans from having a candidate for president in the general election. This is very much in the "don't threaten me with a good time" territory.
They wouldn't win the state anyway so being removed from the ballot is good for them - it makes challenging the nationwide legitimacy of the election easier.
If Trump loses, it will help him to have Fox News (truthfully!) say that millions of people who wanted to vote for him were prevented from doing so.
I bet if Trump isn't on the ballot in CO, there is a significant subset of his voters who would just not vote, with serious implications for down ballot races, especially in the House of Representatives. Think about how that would affect Lauren Boebert
So what. They don't play by the rules. They will lie, cheat, steal, and incite insurrection no matter what rules are or aren't followed.
Trying to pander to these psychos is like trying to play a friendly game of chess with a chimp. You follow the rules, even let the chimp win but no matter what you do the chimp is just gonna throw the board across the room, throw shit at you, and then bite your face off.
Anyway, the court ruled. Just like they did in FL during the Bush v Gore election. Let's let SCOTUS do whatever they're gonna do and go from there.
If the GOP doesn't like it, they can get fucked. Or let them start their CivIL WaR and let's see how it turns out for 'em.
The greater concern to Republicans is that there are other issues people vote on when casting their ballot, not the just President. If their voters stay home, they could lose more than just the Presidency.
And?
He’d say that when if he lost and the viewers would still believe him.
I think the point is that a caucus is overseen by the party, not the state. I still don’t know the legality of doing it at this late stage after the primary has been agreed to and will be set on Jan 5, but that’s their thinking.
This is my favorite part though:
A whole week or two to put together a caucus.
You're not understanding. They're complaining about the primary so their solution is essentially to hold their own primary outside of state control, but he wouldn't be able to run in the general election even if he wins their primary so it doesn't matter. As things currently stand there's only two possibilities, Trump loses the primary to someone else in which case things continue as normal, or Trump wins the primary in which case the GOP wouldn't be able to run a presidential candidate in Colorado. Biden (assuming he's the DNC candidate for the general election) would run unopposed in Colorado.
Probably not earth shattering since he would likely win there even if Trump could run there, but if Trump isn't on the ballot a certain percentage of GOP voters won't bother going to the polls which will hurt the GOP in senate and congress races as well as on state votes.