The Supreme Court of Michigan, a key state in the 2024 presidential election, rejected this Wednesday attempts to prevent Donald Trump from appearing on the ballot next November. The plaintiffs sought the application to the former president of the third section of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits anyone who has participated in an “insurrection or rebellion” from running for public office. The Supreme Court's order, which contains no arguments, does not address whether what Trump did to provoke the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021 can be so defined and is limited to saying: “We are not convinced that the questions presented should be reviewed by this court.”
The decision contrasts with the Colorado Supreme Court's ruling last week that barred Trump from appearing in the state. He prevailed with four votes for and three against, accepting the legal theory that his actions after losing the November 2020 election were enough to disqualify him as a candidate due to the Fourteenth Amendment. Application of that resolution was suspended until Jan. 4, one day before the deadline for Colorado's secretary of state to decide which names should appear on the ballot. Trump's lawyers immediately announced that they would appeal the order to the Washington Supreme Court, which consists of six conservative and three liberal justices. Three of those nine justices were appointed during Trump's time in the White House. Everything indicates that they will accept the case and that their decision will have enormous legal, political and social repercussions in the upcoming election year.
To become president, it is mandatory to be a US citizen, be over 35 years old and have lived in the country for 14 years. The Constitution does not specifically prohibit him from being investigated for a federal crime (even if. As in Trump's case, there are 91 indictments in four different cases. Nor would he drop out of the race if he is found guilty or even ends up in prison.
The Fourteenth Amendment, passed in 1868, is one of the most influential constitutional amendments in the history of North American democracy because it was designed to grant and grant citizenship to any person “born or naturalized in the United States,” including those who were enslaved guarantee equality for all citizens before the law. The third phase was intended to prevent the reemergence of the Confederate rebels defeated in the Civil War (1861-1865). It has been used in rare cases; since 1919 only two.
Dissenting opinion
Democratic-majority Michigan judges believe there is nothing in the Midwestern state's election law that would prevent Trump from running. The judgment is unsigned and the result of the judges' vote has not been announced. Whatever the case, he agrees with the lower court's ruling that it is not up to Michigan's judicial system to decide Trump's suitability to return to the White House.
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The Michigan law includes a dissenting opinion, signed by Justice Elizabeth Welch, in which she compares the present case to that of Colorado and says that the “election laws [de ambos Estados] differ (…) [de manera] relevant to explaining why the plaintiffs in the Michigan presidential election case are wrong.”
After the resolution was announced, Trump celebrated it on his social network Truth, where he once again promoted false theories that Joe Biden unfairly won the last presidential election. “The Michigan Supreme Court has forcefully and rightly rejected the attempt by desperate Democrats to remove the front-runner in the 2024 presidential election – me – from the ballot in the great state of Michigan,” wrote the former president, who is leading in all polls on voting intentions for the Republican nomination are clear. “This deplorable election-rigging tactic has failed across the country, even in states that have historically leaned Democratic. Colorado is the only state that fell victim to the plan. This decision (…) is ridiculed and ridiculed all over the world. We must prevent the 2024 election from being rigged and stolen, just as the 2020 election was stolen; Just look at the utter mess we have as a result of the corrupt Joe Biden violently destroying everything within his reach, from our once great economy to our justice system. We must save our country from decline and the radical left. Let’s Make America Great Again!”
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