I recognize this is not the point of the post, but an accused felon doesn’t really make sense, since a felon is someone who is formally tried and convicted of a felonious crime.
The more extreme republicans in Congress have been trying to mangle the definition to fit any politics or laws they don’t agree with. Their thinking is something like “this action will hurt the country, therefore people who support it are committing treason!” Of course one problem is they can’t tell the difference between facts and their beliefs/predictions. The other is of course that’s not the definition of treason, which specifically means a betrayal by colluding with an outside party, or an insurrection (you know, like their leader tried). And to normal people it’s obviously so dangerous to start claiming that politics and policies you don’t agree with are “treason”.
Can a governor do that, though? From my limited knowledge of US political structure, a governor is part of the executive branch, and overruling electoral process can only be done my the judicial branch.
NAL, but almost certainly not. Governors don't get to decide who gets to appear on a ballot. Trump got removed, because he was found to have participated in an insurrection, a clear violation of the 14th Amendment.
If they want to remove Biden, they'll have to prove he did something disqualifying.
Sure. States have authority over their own ballot process. Would it be a civil lawsuit violating a person's Constitutional rights that are Constitutionally valid candidates? Could be.
But Dan Patrick is also "joking" for clout, otherwise, he'd just be disrespecting the US Constitution due to political agenda interference. Then again, the GOP is known to act as mere children in their politics and their followers are known to eat that shit right up to 'own the libs'.
Yeah, we all know he wasn't joking. He probably said it before somebody pointed out that it's against his state constitution to do so. And even if he already knew it was against the constitution, he could have said it just to garner support from his deplorables.
Technically all they can do is sign or veto bills, but the executive branch tends to work with the legislative on policy. It's why Presidents are credited/blamed for passing or not passing legislation during their terms.
They're trying to water down the word "insurrection" as hard as they can so they can invoke the 14th. They haven't really thought it through much more than that, much like the current impeachment discussions.
They have been bleating for nearly three years now how "it wasn't really an insurrection", and I suppose that has not worked well, because most people continue to ignore them and their nonsense narratives about that. Now they are going to downplay the very term itself. Makes a certain kind of sense.
There's a large swath of dumbassery in the current congress, especially the house and especially since maga, but don't make the mistake of thinking that all cons are dumb. Tons of the senators are lawyers. They aren't ignorant of the law, they're evil people using the law to line their pockets and make the world a worse place. Turtle McConnell couldn't have been grifting in politics for 137 years if he was stupid.
States actually have quite a lot of control of who to put on their ballots. The prelude to the First Civil War had quite a lot of slaving garbage states, like Texas, only state to fight a war for slavery twice, not carrying Lincoln on the ballots, for example.
This is going to lead to a civil war. The Republicans simply cannot accept any consequences for their actions, or any failure of their insane message to win a majority vote, so they resort to insurrection.
Make no mistake — by not waiting for a conviction to remove Trump from the ballot, this is the Pandora’s box that has been opened. Just like impeachment, it will be used and abused.
He was convicted—of participating in an insurrection by incitement. That's what the judge before SCOCO ruled, and SCOCO finished the groundwork she laid out. He was therefore rightly ejected from the Colorado ballot under the 14th Amendment.
If you mean waiting for a conviction from his other cases, none of them would bar him from running. Felons are allowed to run for president.
But no matter what, Republicans will always use whatever they can to do damage. Justice shouldn't stop just because you know they'll continue to abuse the system as they have always done.
"Convicted" is not the correct term here. That would (outside of impeachment) require a criminal charge, followed by a guilty plea or a trial, and if a trial, a finding of guilty by the finder of fact (either a judge or a jury).
As a finding of fact, in both a Colorado district court, and in the Colorado Supreme Court, Trump "engaged in insurrection." I would need to look and see whether Michigan and Minnesota courts found the same fact.
None of the 14A S3 cases charge anyone with any crime.
Show me in the 14th Amendment Section 3 where it says you have to be convicted.
Here is the full text. Show me any mention of convicted:
Section 3
No person 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, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
If the court was not able to find a factual basis for the requested relief then they would simply deny the application/complaint. The court reviewed the facts and granted the requested relief. Why does a different court need to rule on the facts before this court can act?
Yeah, except there was very detailed reasoning that went along with that ruling. Permitting crybaby ass Texas officials to just...follow their feelings would be insulting to everyone.
The insurrection clause was used after the Civil War exactly as intended, to prevent treasonous filth from running for office despite not being convicted in criminal courts.