Attorneys at the Minnesota supreme court argued on Thursday that the former president Donald Trump should not be allowed to appear on the state’s ballots for president because of his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and role in the insurrection.
A group of voters wants the courts to weigh a clause in the 14th amendment, which disqualifies an “officer of the United States” who has taken an oath to defend the constitution from holding office if they have “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the country. In dozens of pages in their initial court filing, they cite examples of Trump’s election interference, from the fake electors scheme to his comments to rioters on 6 January 2021.
“Despite having sworn an oath to support the constitution of the United States, Trump ‘engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or [gave] aid or comfort to the enemies thereof’,” the voters argue.
Ronald Fein, an attorney with Free Speech for People, which represents voters in the case, said the group wants the court to grant an evidentiary hearing to go over the facts in the case. The Trump camp argues the case is a political question, not one for the courts, and that it should be dismissed either for jurisdiction issues or on its merits.
The Minnesota justices asked attorneys probing questions about the legal ambiguities and novelty of the case, as well as what, exactly, constitutes an insurrection or rebellion that would fall under this area of the constitution.
Chief Justice Natalie Hudson said even if the court were to agree that it could intervene in this manner, there was a strong question about whether it should.
“‘Should we’ is the question that concerns me most,” she said during oral arguments on Thursday.
Fein, in comments to reporters after, said the courts should intervene and parse out the facts of the case.
“This is a matter of fact finding and applying the language of the constitution to a set of facts,” he said. “That’s exactly what courts do. This court and courts all across the country do every day.”
The lawsuit is one of several the former president faces in his bid to return to the White House, not to mention the various criminal and civil actions he is currently defending against. A similar petition is the subject of a trial in Colorado this week. Legal experts say the Reconstruction-era clause is ripe for the courts, though it has never been used to forestall a presidential candidate in this way.
Free Speech for People represents the voters in the case, who include the former Minnesota secretary of state Joan Growe and the former Minnesota supreme court justice Paul H Anderson.
Trump’s attorneys and the Republican party have fought back against the suit, claiming the matter is a political question instead of a legal one. Trump’s campaign also claims there’s “no evidence that President Trump intended or supported any violent or unlawful activity seeking to overthrow the government of the United States, either on January 6 or at any other time.
“This request is manifestly inappropriate,” Trump’s team wrote in a brief. “Both the federal constitution and Minnesota law place the resolution of this political issue where it belongs: the democratic process, in the hands of either Congress or the people of the United States.”
Nicholas J Nelson, an attorney representing Trump in the case, said most other cases deciding candidate eligibility revolve around easily proven facts, such as whether they are old enough to hold office, not something where the facts themselves involve detailed interpretation. “There is no more political question,” he said, than who should be president.
The Trump campaign fundraised off the 14th amendment cases this week, pointing to the Colorado trial and calling it the “next desperate attempt by Crooked Joe and the Radical Democrats to slow down our campaign”.
The Minnesota secretary of state, Steve Simon, a Democrat, has supported the idea of the courts deciding the question, though has not weighed in on whether Trump should be on the ballot in the state’s March 2024 primary.
Groups have sought to bar politicians from the ballot for their roles in the insurrection before, though the arguments have not been successful. It is expected that one of the cases involving Trump could be taken to the conservative US supreme court.
The cases challenging Trump’s eligibility popped off after an article from two law professors argued the former president would be excluded from seeking the high office again because of a clause in the 14th amendment. One of the professors, Michael Stokes Paulsen, teaches at Minnesota’s University of St Thomas School of Law.
Fein said his group planned to bring suits in more states and expects one of them could get appealed to the high court, depending on how the state courts decide and in what order.
“We plan to file in multiple additional states, but I’m not going to tell Trump in public where we’re filing,” he said.
