On Thursday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case to determine whether the Colorado state Supreme Court was correct to rule Trump ineligible to appear on the ballot. According to two legal analysts, Chief Justice Samuel Alito’s comments were veiled threats.
The situation
“Alito was saying: ‘Well, if you allow Colorado to knock Trump off the ballot, there’ll be more lawsuits by people who are willing to weaponize the legal system,’” Dahlia Lithwick of Slate explained. “I guess there’s only one answer to that, the answer that Jason Murray gave, which was that courts actually do know what to do with frivolous, threatening lawsuits that have no point.”
Barely veiled
“Another answer,” Lithwick continued, “could be: ‘I’m sorry, Justice Alito, are you threatening me?’”
The big difference
“It’s a threat that if a majority of the court allows Colorado to remove Trump from the ballot,” Lithwick explained, “justices like Alito are going to come out swinging for the frivolous, ridiculous cases that follow — which really should not be compared to this one, since it’s very much rooted in the Constitution.”
The case in question
The Colorado state Supreme Court’s verdict was based on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which specifies that any officer of the US who “engages in insurrection” should not be eligible to hold office. Maine’s secretary of state also agreed that Trump should be barred from the ballot.
Arguing against
One of the arguments made by Trump’s lawyers, however, was that — even if Trump did “engage in insurrection,” which they deny — he should only be removed by Congress, and only after he actually won the presidency.
Just a small problem
However, that would leave the decision up to a group of legislators that might acquit Trump for political reasons. Over 60 House Republicans recently signed a resolution asserting that Trump did not engage in an insurrection.
Threatening democracy
Alito’s comment was “a threat that red states will try to retaliate,” Lithwick argued. “Ron DeSantis will remove Joe Biden from the ballot because he’s a traitor or a Chinese spy or whatever other reason — just fill in the blank — and Sam Alito will be ready to let it happen.”
Self-centered
Mark Joseph Stern agreed with Lithwick, adding that the conservative justices “kept fretting that a ruling for Colorado could lead to such dangerous places.” “It was all consequence-based judging!” he elaborated. “From top to bottom! I think that’s another example of the hypocrisy disparity between the different sides of the court.”
Ridiculous
Lithwick slammed Alito’s tone as “menacing” and his veiled threats “mob-like.” It was as if Alito was saying, “Nice democracy you got — it’d be a shame if something happened to it.”
Helping hand
According to The Nation’s legal analyst, Elie Mystal, Alito also jumped in to help Trump lawyer Jonathan Mitchell when he seemed to be struggling. At one point, after multiple judges pointed out that Mitchell’s argument wasn’t a constitutional one, Alito came “to the rescue” and rephrased the argument for the lawyer.
Keeping the case alive
Alito threw Mitchell “a lifeline,” legal analyst Norm Eisen agreed on X. A professor called Alito’s rephrased version of Mitchell’s statement a “weird argument.”
Bizarre defense
Trump’s lawyers also argued in a pre-hearing filing that barring Trump from the ballot would be “anti-democratic.” However, the Constitution bars plenty of people from the ballot for various reasons, such as citizenship and age. Is it anti-democratic that people under the age of 35 are ineligible to run for president?
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