October 30, 2023 09:43 AM UTC

Trump Ballot Access Lawsuit Underway in Denver

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• by: Colorado Pols

Two weeks after trying (and failing) to get a lawsuit dismissed that seeks to keep Donald Trump off of the 2024 ballot in Colorado, lawyers for The Big Orange Guy will be in court all week arguing that Jan. 6, 2021 was a totally friendly insurrection.

As Nick Coltrain reports for The Denver Post:

Over the next five days, a Denver judge is set to hear arguments for why former President Donald Trump should not be allowed on the state’s 2024 ballot — along with his lawyers’ case for why she should reject the unusual challenge.

The ballot disqualification trial, set to begin Monday, will be the first time testimony and evidence are presented in a case that invokes the 14th Amendment to bar the Republican front-runner from a state’s ballot. It puts Colorado at the forefront of a novel legal fight that has united liberal critics and current and former Republicans who contend that Trump’s alleged role in the Jan. 6, 2021, siege of the nation’s Capitol disqualified him from being eligible to run for national office again.

A provision in the Civil War-era federal constitutional amendment bars people who engaged in insurrection or rebellion from holding office.

But there are key unresolved questions: Which actions meet that threshold? Who can enforce it? And what is the burden of proof necessary to bar someone from the ballot under that provision?

Those considerations will be heard by Denver District Court Judge Sarah B. Wallace.

Trump faces similar 14th Amendment lawsuits in Minnesota and Michigan; the Minnesota Supreme Court will begin to hear arguments in their case on Thursday.

Trump’s legal team in Colorado includes former Secretary of State Scott Gessler. The Colorado Republican Party has also joined the case in support of keeping Trump on the ballot (should he win the GOP nomination in 2024).