A Michigan judge has ruled the ex-president can contest the Republican nomination, rejecting an “insurrection” lawsuit by activists.
Former US President Donald Trump is eligible to remain on Michigan’s 2024 presidential primary ballot for the Republican Party, a state court has ruled. A local activist group had sought to bar Trump from running for office by filing an “insurrection” lawsuit against him.
Michigan Court of Claims judge James Redford delivered the ruling on Tuesday. The decision followed a legal bid by liberal activist group Free Speech for People, which had claimed that Trump’s alleged role in the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot should disqualify him from campaigning for elected office.
In his verdict, Redford explained that deciding if the events of January 6 represented a “rebellion or insurrection, or whether or not someone participated in it” should be deferred to Congress. He further stressed that Michigan’s electoral authorities do not have the power to remove Trump from the ballot.
Free Speech for People had invoked Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, a Civil War-era constitutional clause stating that a person cannot run for elected office if they have “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the constitution after taking an oath to support it.
Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said that his team welcomed the decision and “anticipates the future dismissals of the other 14th Amendment cases.”
Trump, who according to multiple polls comfortably leads his rivals for the GOP nomination, has faced similar lawsuits in other states, some of which have already been thrown out by courts. While the Republican firebrand is at the center of a litany of legal battles, he has never been charged with insurrection.
A lawsuit against Trump was dismissed by Minnesota’s Supreme Court last week, while a verdict in a similar case in Colorado is expected by Friday.
Last month, the US Supreme Court rejected an attempt by Texas Republican John Anthony Castro to bar Trump from seeking reelection in 2024 on the grounds of the 14th Amendment.
Trump is also being tried on federal conspiracy charges related to his alleged attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, making him the first former US head of state to face a federal indictment.
Elsewhere, the Republican frontrunner has federal charges hanging over him related to his handling of top-secret government documents, while he is also being sued in New York by both the city and the state.
The former president has repeatedly dismissed the legal challenges against him as a politically motivated “witch hunt” designed to derail his 2024 chances.
Why bother banning him from running when they already have:
1) Dominion voting machines that connect to the internet and can be manipulated remotely (proven in countless tests and symposiums since 2020)
2) An army of foot soldiers dumping hundreds of ballots at a time into hilariously unprotected drop boxes that just sit out in the open (there are literally hours of CCTV footage of this happening).
3) “Leaky” water pipes that force ballot inspectors to leave the room for hours.
4) Election officials who simply throw inspectors out altogether and board up windows (Video evidence of this as well as over 1000 sworn affidavits that were filed in December 2020)
5)Other election officials who announce counting is over for the night, only to resume again in secret at 1am when all inspectors have left (Totally normal behaviour BTW – again CCTV and sworn affidavits attesting to this).
6) Graveyard shift workers who pull suitcases filled with unchecked ballots from beneath tables and surreptitiously scan them in their hundreds while nobody else is around (yet more CCTV evidence of this).
7) Trucks that magically appear from nowhere filled with ballots at 4am (CCTV evidence of this).
8) A corporately owned media who refuse to report on any of the above, disingenuously sniggering “where’s the evidence” even as a mountain of evidence is presented to them.
9) Social media companies who censor anyone sharing information and evidence with an iron fist that would’ve shocked Stalin.
9) State and federal judiciary who refuse to even hear the legal arguments or view any of the mountain of evidence put forward. A Supreme Court who rule they cannot do anything about election fraud prior to an election because no fraud has yet occurred, but that they also cannot do anything AFTER an election has been held as it is then too late (probably the most openly ludicrous abdication of responsibility I’ve ever heard in my life).
10) an uninformed public who don’t bother to look or think beyond the nightly news on the idiot box, happy for their minds to stay mainstream media playdough.
And in four years absolutely NOTHING has been done to address or correct any of the above, so why should we expect anything but the exact same outcome yet again in 2024?
Nah, elections are a thing of the past, not just in the states but in the entire western world. We went from elections taking one night to now taking a month. Shouldn’t all our wonderful technological advances have made the process FASTER not slower? And isn’t it strange how all the most widely unpopular people (Ardern, Trudeau, Macron, Lula, Biden etc) can’t openly walk among their booing citizens for fear of being torn to pieces, but somehow keep mysteriously winning elections?
Eh whatever, I’ve probably just had a bit too much to think again. Trump is clearly guilty. You can tell it really isn’t a politically motivated witch hunt by the fact that he’s only facing 97 charges 😒👍
LOL…so true but they also have armies of pissed off voters who know the game now and are probably out of patience….
Kudos to your substantive comment.
BTW: ‘people’ like Ardern, Trudeau, Macron, Biden and other criminals will NEVER EVER again walk freely among citizens. Even their offspring are damned. What would you do if you meet one of these creatures on a bush walk or on the beach?
Yeah because the alternative would no doubt have been civil war 2.0…..
Donald says “America First”.
Winston says “NZ First”.
Maybe they can become buddies.
And rescue both countries.