You’d have to have been trapped under a very large rock to have missed the months of debate over a handful of states trying to keep Donald Trump off their primary ballot. He led an insurrection, they said, so that Constitution-thing they typically loath demanded they act … like ignorant partisan children.
Left-wing agitators petitioned states across America’s inflated plain to block The Donald. Their hope was that by limiting the states in which he could compete in what is effectively a private corporation’s nomination process, he might never achieve the delegates necessary to challenge their Democrat contender. The argument centered on the 14th Amendment and the supposition that Donald Trump led an insurrection and was, therefore, ineligible.
Whether you believe that or not is irrelevant. “States have no power under the Constitution to enforce Section 3 with respect to federal offices, especially the Presidency.” Neither Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, Michigan, nor any other state has executive authority on these grounds. So sayeht many a non-partisan confirmed by a 9-0 ruling of the US Supreme Court.
Yes, all the so-called Liberal justices agreed—a truly bipartisan ruling, which pissed off the progressives to no end and set up the current outrage. States are charged with overseeing the execution of elections. They are to set up polling times and places, ensure access, the collection and counting of ballots, and they get to decide the dance steps to get on that ballot not otherwise established in the US Constitition.
It is a difference with a distinction.
The two cases … are completely different. The democrats tried to block Trump by accusing him of being an insurrectionist under a Civil War-era Constitutional provision that only applies to state officials. Ohio and Alabama’s issues relate to simple qualifying deadlines that apply to all candidates.
Trump’s call for peaceful protest and the lack of any weapons at what in progressive parlance is called the Capitol riot aside, the Constitution (apparently) does not give States the power to enforce Sec. 3 of the 14th Amendment, but it does empower them to manage the logistics of ensuring that elections – no matter who is on the ballot – happen. Both Ohio and Alabama have long-standing deadlines, which the DNC ignored when scheduling its nominating convention, and this is not their fault?
Like most of what goes wrong in America, this is a Demcorat-created problem.
And so far, the DNC has not sued either state, presumably because they would surely lose on the merits, not least because they control when their convention is held.
Hate Trump all you like, but neither Ohio nor Alabama established their rules based on his choosing to run for elected office. Everyone else who intends to appear on the ballot, regardless of party, needs to meet the same deadline.
[Alabama Secretary of State Wes] Allen sent a letter to Alabama Democratic Party Chairman Randy Kelley saying that the state’s Aug. 15 certification deadline is four days before the Democratic National Convention is set to begin. Allen indicated that Biden’s name will not appear on the ballot unless the deadline is met.
“If this Office has not received a valid certificate of nomination from the Democratic Party following its convention by the statutory deadline, I will be unable to certify the names of the Democratic Party’s candidates for President and Vice President for ballot preparation for the 2024 general election,” Allen wrote.
And it is not the crisis advertised, but there is a problem within the problem.
The State Party can request “provisional certification for Democratic and Republican nominees,” and the state can allow it. The issue for Democrats—who insist that despite this matter, Joe Biden will be on all 50 state ballots—is what if it’s not Joe come November. Disregarding his declining mental state, the man is increasingly unpopular even among Democrats. Rumors abound across the political spectrum about the plan to replace him before November. Biden sweeps the nomination, then voluntarily bows out for health reasons, and the DNC picks his replacement—someone younger and less disliked who can presumably distance themselves from the past four years’ worth of policies they all supported.
If state parties have already sent provisional certifications with Joe Biden’s name on them, any replacement on the Biden-Harris ticket won’t appear on those ballots.
The New Republic to the Rescue
The New Republic article notes the 82-day requirement, the scheduling snafu, and exceptions and past accommodations that might resolve the 2024 problem, but it can’t help but be what it is: a progressive press mouthpiece.
While both Allen and LaRose could well be trying to simply uphold state laws, the moves seem remarkably suspicious given recent lawsuits regarding Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. The Colorado state supreme court attempted to kick Trump off of the 2024 ballot due to his role in the January 6 insurrection, which the justices determined violated Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment.
While The New Republic notes the Supreme Court striking down Colorado’s unconstitutional effort to keep Trump off its primary ballot, it never notes the complicity of liberal justices in the 9-0 decision, including a Biden appointee. To them, it is the Roberts Court, which “will have to swiftly reinstate [Biden and Harris], since states don’t have the authority to remove federal officeholders, right? But that would require consistency from John Roberts’s Supreme Court, whose values are in question.”
Hardly. Were the matter not to reach a means for reconciliation (which we doubt) and head to the Highest Court, its ruling would likely acknowledge that States do indeed have that authority (as the Constitution is silent on the matter – not that this has stopped the court as often as it should) and that it is the DNC’s responsibility to work out their differences with the states.
Which it will, unless the Dems are truly throwing the dice on another Biden-Harris ticket and Joe’s ability to keep what is left of his wits about him until at least November. That’s how it sounds, and I’m curious to see if that’s true.
