Former President Donald Trump’s lawyers do not have a track record of crafting sophisticated legal arguments in his defense. Their strategy has often focused more on creating opportunities for his political diatribes than producing winning moments in court. The latest filing from his team before the Supreme Court, though, is a wonder in terms of throwing literally anything at the wall and hoping it will stick.
Trump is asking the justices to overturn the recent decision of the Colorado Supreme Court to remove him from the primary ballot. In a 4-3 ruling, the court determined that he is disqualified from running for president under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. That clause mandates that nobody who swore an oath to support the Constitution and then engaged in insurrection “shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State.”
To put this argument in a real filing with the Supreme Court is, in layman’s terms, absolutely bonkers
My colleague Jordan Rubin and I have already covered many of the reasons that Trump’s petition lists for the Supreme Court to take up the case. But one argument in the filing stands out, both for its novelty and its audacity. “Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits individuals only from holding office,” the petition reads. “It does not prevent anyone from running for office, or from being elected to office, because Congress can remove a section 3 disqualification at any time—and Congress can remove that disability after a candidate is elected but before his term begins.”
You read that correctly — and it doesn’t stop there, confidently rolling with the least effective of hair splitting. “Forcing President Trump to prove that he is not disqualified before appearing on the ballot effectively adds a new, extra-constitutional requirement to running for office,” it continues. “It…
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