Colorado election officials would not commit to keeping Donald Trump as an option on its 2024 ballot amid pressure from several ethics groups claiming that the former president violated the 14th Amendment in his actions surrounding the January 6 siege on the U.S. Capitol.
On Thursday, Colorado Secretary of State Jenna Griswold's office declined to say whether the state's top election official would grant ballot access to Trump when questioned by reporters in Colorado after a pair of advocacy organizations wrote letters to nine secretaries of state invoking Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
That statute, first implemented in the wake of the Civil War, states that a person who "engaged in insurrection or rebellion" after taking the oath of office should be prevented from running again.
"The evidence is overwhelming that Donald Trump incited and mobilized the insurrection on January 6, 2021, at our nation's Capitol," Alexandra Flores-Quilty, campaign director for Free Speech For People (FSFP), one of the groups behind the letter, wrote in a statement Wednesday. "The U.S. Constitution is clear that anyone who takes an oath of office and then engages in insurrection is forever barred from holding public office again. Election officials must carry out their duty, follow this constitutional mandate, and bar Trump from the ballot."
While efforts by one of Trump's political rivals to disqualify him on a 14th Amendment basis are pending in federal court, however, Colorado's top election official would not wade into questions about whether he would remain on the ballot there, regardless of a final decision.
"We are going to officially decline to comment at this time," Annie Orloff, a spokesperson for Griswold's office, told Colorado Newsline in an article published Thursday.
Others are also holding comment. Out of the other nine states contacted by FSFP and the Mi Familia Vota Education Fund—California, Georgia, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Nevada—several declined comment when contacted by Newsweek for comment.
At this point, his eligibility is likely a non-issue. While Colorado has until January 5 to certify participants in its Super Tuesday presidential primaries, political parties themselves typically do not submit their candidates for the primary ballots until December, a spokesperson for the Massachusetts Secretary of State's Office told Newsweek. Nomination papers for the presidential primary will not be released until September.
Though recent 14th Amendment-based lawsuits have recently been successful—one advocacy group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, in Washington, successfully disqualified a former Republican county commissioner in Otero County, New Mexico, on 14th Amendment grounds in September over his participation in the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol—litigation against Trump has yet to be heard by a judge.
A successful challenge to his candidacy prior to the Republican primaries remains a long shot.
The most prominent litigation aiming to disqualify Trump, brought by Republican presidential candidate John Anthony Castro in Florida, is under appeal after his standing in the case was contested by Trump-appointed Judge Aileen Cannon, a central figure in the federal classified documents case involving the former president.
