2024: Biggest Supreme Court Case ACLJ Has Ever Fought

➡ The Colorado Republican State Central Committee has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court against a ruling by the Colorado Supreme Court that could remove Donald Trump from the ballot, arguing he incited insurrection per the 14th Amendment, Section 3, in spite of his acquittal in the Senate. The GOP is asking the Court to determine if a state can disqualify a presidential candidate without Congressional authorization; whether a President is subject to disqualification under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment; and if this interpretation of the Amendment is correct.

This is the petition for rid of Sir Ferrari, the Colorado Republican State Central Committee. That’s the state GOP versus Norma Anderson. She’s the secretary of state. That litigation is now at the Supreme Court of the United States. In fact, what you’re seeing on the screen has actually been printed. It looks like this. It’s a very formal process you have to get into. So it ends up looking like this.

And for those that are watching on radio or listening on radio, it’s about 150 pages of bound material. Reads like a book, looks like a book. It’s called a petition for rid of. Search for a. That is now done at the printers being filed now. So the case will be officially docked. Logan, this afternoon, a lot of people saw the news come up over the weekend. They maybe don’t know the full scope of the details.

So I think it’s something we should break down a little more of what happened and why we’re involved. So we represent 15 state gops around the country where you’ve had these ballot challenges. And when I say a ballot challenge, various groups or individuals will file a lawsuit against either the board of elections or the secretary of state saying, we don’t want Trump on the ballot because there was an insurrection and he caused it.

And they’re utilizing the 14th amendment, section three’s insurrection clause. The problem is, of course, the former president’s never been charged with insurrection. The only time the insurrection issue was adjudicated was at the United States Senate during the impeachment proceedings, where he was acquitted of that charge. But the Colorado Supreme Court said, yeah, a trial judge in Denver can decide that he committed an insurrection in Washington, DC, and remove him from the ballot.

So the Colorado Supreme Court said, he’s off the ballot. What they said in the opinion was, if you file by January 4, which we’re filing today, then they will allow him to stay on the ballot until the Supreme Court rules. We’re also going to be filing a motion for expedited review. Petition for Sirshari is a request for review. That means court, we need you to hear this case, because literally, havoc could develop here.

So what we said is, you do a thing called questions presented. This is where you put out there the questions the court needs to address. So what we said was the Supreme Court of Colorado held that states possess authority regardless of the lack of congressional authorization. And that’s because Congress should be deciding this, not these states, to determine that a presidential candidate is disqualified under section three of the 14th Amendment.

That’s called the disqualification clause, and it says, if you’re found guilty of insurrection, you’re disqualified from running. But we have three questions. First is whether the president falls within the list of officials subject to the disqualification of the section three of the 14th Amendment. And that’s because the president is not an officer of the United States. He is a branch of government unto himself. He appoints the officers of the United States with the advising consent of Congress.

He is not an officer of the United States. They’re trying to get President Trump off the ballot under this 14th Amendment, the section three. And if he is not an officer, then this does not apply to him, period. And all of these cases should be thrown out. The second issue is whether the section three of the 14th Amendment, which is the one that says, again, disqualified if you’re engaged in insurrection, is self executing.

And what that means is the 14th Amendment says that here are these rules. You’ve got all these due process, equal protection, and Congress will pass laws so that you can enforce the 14th Amendment. Well, they didn’t pass laws regarding insurrection. There was initially something, and then it expired, I think, in the 1920s, and it never came up again. Now, there is a criminal statute on insurrection, but President Trump was never charged with insurrection.

So to have a state court decide that you can remove somebody without a determination at the federal level that there’s been an insurrection by this individual candidate is outrageous, in my view, under the normal procedure. Okay, if this was a normal supreme court case, Logan, like you used to go to watch me do, and hopefully the grandkids will be able to watch me do very soon. Here. You’d file this thing now, okay.

They would have 30 days to respond, which would put you at the end of January. Then we would have another 14 days to get in a reply brief that puts you in the middle of February. Then they would take it to conference in March. Then if they granted review, you have 90 days to get your brief in, which puts you in June. Then the term is over. So they would hear argument in October, and the election is in November.

So we are filing tomorrow, and I’ll get more into it tomorrow. I’m trying to go through the procedural stuff one at a time. There’s a lot that you want. Sure. We’re filing a motion to expedite review as well, because you can’t let this go this long. It is fundamentally, folks, your right to vote. I don’t care which candidate you’re for, it’s your right to vote. That’s what’s at stake here.

This is talking about whether you’re Republican or Democrat. This has very long term implications if one person can decide not to put someone on a ballot. We’ve got a year end that is just days away. And we were able to free up additional matching funds. The first time we’ve ever done this is there’s triple match. If you donate $10, that’s equivalent now with 30, 30 is the equivalent of 90.

90 is the equivalent of 270. If someone donates 1000, it’s 3000. If somebody donates 3000, it’s 9000. It’s a triple match. We were able to do that because of the generosity of our donors. So I want to encourage you today to donate to support the work of the ACLJ. We said, this is a judicial emergency. We need you to stand with us. We’re in the final five days of our faith and freedom year and drive.

It sets our budget for the next year, but it’ll also help us get through the Supreme Court case. And like I said, now we’ve got the biggest supreme court case in our history right here at the end of the year because there’ll be a dish. We got one set of briefs filed. There’s going to be multiple more. So, I mean, the work does not stop. .