Trump clings to a bizarre legal argument to remain in the electoral race

The eventual presence of donald trump on the ballots of two states USA It depends on the interpretation given to a single paragraph of the Constitution, which monopolizes the complaints of his opponents and the resources that the former president has already presented and contemplates.

Section 3 of Amendment United States or has provided aid or facilities to enemies of the country.

Colorado and Maine expelled Trump from the Republican primaries in those states in December, relying on that argument for his role in the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol. In turn, the legal defense of the former US president (2017-2021) clings, among other allegations, to the fact that the paragraph does not mention the position of president among the vetoed positions.

“You have to twist the language a lot to say that the president is not included,” Jackson Barlow, a politics professor at Juniata College in Pennsylvania, told EFE.

That 1868 amendment was approved after the American Civil War (1861-1865) to prevent people associated with the southern rebels of the Confederacy from coming to power and since then, according to the organization Citizens for Ethics, it has only been applied to eight people in lower-ranking hierarchies.

Trump could be the ninth if his resources do not work and he has entered the country into “uncharted territory,” adds Justin Crowe, professor of Political Science at Williams College in Massachusetts.

The appeal against Maine’s decision was filed this Tuesday and is expected to do the same against Colorado’s resolution imminently, since the deadline to do so ends on Thursday.

In the two criminal cases that Trump has open in Georgia and Washington DC for his attempts to reverse the results of the 2020 presidential elections, won by the Democrat Joe Bidenis not charged with insurrection.

Linguistic nuances

“What does it mean to have participated in an insurrection or rebellion? It’s not specified, so it’s open to interpretation. And is it enough for the Colorado Supreme Court or the Maine Secretary of State to affirm that such an insurrection has occurred? This underscores the complications of the effort to disqualify trump”, the Williams College expert tells EFE.

In the US federal system, each state is responsible for organizing the elections, including the presidential ones, and thus has the power to expel a candidate even if he or she has not been charged, reducing support in the general race.

Each state has USA as many voters as there are members in Congress. A presidential candidate needs the vote of at least 270 to win the election and traditionally whoever wins in a state gets the vote of all of his or her voters.

“One vote can make a difference, so this is an important issue,” emphasizes Richard Groper, a professor at California State University in Los Angeles, for whom it is “difficult but not impossible” to prove that Trump participated in the “insurrection.” ” on January 6.

The Supreme Court could take a position and establish a position applicable to all states if it decides to get involved. Michigan, for example, refused to disqualify Trump in December, considering that the case raises a political question that should not be resolved by Justice.

Legal and political implications

The scope of these cases now exceeds the merely legal. trump He is the favorite Republican candidate for the presidential elections next November and, according to Crowe, could benefit from the current situation regardless of how it ends.

If he wins his resources in Colorado and Maine, to reproach liberals and Democrats for having tried to keep him away from the polls, and if he loses them, to mobilize the population and request more support alleging that the opposing side is so “scared” that they want to veto him .

“Nothing like this has ever happened before and our institutions are going to be challenged this year to respond to the threat that Trump, his followers and his lawyers pose to them,” agrees Barlow, for whom the country is going through such polarization that there are those who may see it justified in skipping traditional political mechanisms to achieve their goals.