Primer: Trump Ballot 2024
In the past month, the states of Colorado and Maine have disqualified former President Trump from appearing on their ballots, decisions that Trump has appealed. Many people support the decisions that the Colorado judiciary and Maine’s Secretary of State have made, claiming that Trump’s acts of insurrection make him ineligible for the office of president. People who reject these decisions, however, claim that removing a major party front runner from the ballot is political and un-democratic. The ramifications of the choice to allow or bar Trump from running will be massive, potentially altering how our democracy functions. With that in mind, Northwestern’s Political Union is starting off our first debate of Winter Quarter with the following resolution:
Donald Trump should be removed from the 2024 Presidential Ballot.
Please enjoy the following primer!
The main argument for the pro is that reading the text of the Constitution leads to the ineligibility of Trump to hold future political office. Section 3 of the 14th Amendment says that one can not “hold any office, civil or military, under the United States” if they had “previously taken an oath…to support the Constitution of the United States” and then “engaged in insurrection.” Trump, in his inauguration to be the President of the United States, made an oath to uphold the constitution, an oath that he then broke by engaging in insurrection on January 6th. Thus, former President Trump should not be on the 2024 Presidential Ballot as the Constitution says that he is ineligible. Another argument is made by Perry Bacon Jr. in his article for The Washington Post. Bacon argues that based solely on the fact of Trump’s insurrection and his shown threats to democracy, he should not be on the 2024 ballot. Trump lost a fair election and then propagated false claims that the election was rigged, leading to the insurrection on January 6th. If Trump were to take power again as President, Bacon claims, he could completely destroy American democracy, successfully invalidating elections that he loses. By taking the step to remove Trump from the 2024 ballot, the danger that Trump poses to the very being of our democracy is dramatically diminished. One final argument for the pro comes from a Vox article. If Trump were to stay on the ballot simply because he was a front runner in the 2024 elections, it would invalidate the equality of the law. If you accept the arguments made above, then it would be unjust for Trump to be given an exception simply because he has a serious chance of winning this election.
The arguments for the con side also have much merit. Primarily, people want Trump on the 2024 ballot as it would feel undemocratic if he was taken off. Maine Senator Susan Collins argued on X that “Maine voters should decide who wins the election — not a Secretary of State chosen by the Legislature.” Not giving people the choice to select or reject Trump can feel in conflict with the basic principles of democracy. By taking Trump off the 2024 Presidential ballots, our American democratic process could be tarnished. Another argument, given in the Vox article linked above, is that removing Trump at the state level could lead to a very dangerous and political future. Vox gives the hypothetical of Republican judges in Florida fabricating false insurrection claims about Joe Biden to remove him from the ballot in 2024. If Trump is taken off the 2024 Presidential ballot, a decision made on a state by state basis, then other candidates could face bogus claims that incorrectly remove them from ballots too. Thus, to stop the precedent of states removing political candidates from their ballots that they don’t like, we should keep Trump on the ballot for 2024. Finally, as argued in The Tennessean, Trump was not fully given due process in the states where he has been taken off the ballot. Colorado had no jury decide if Trump committed an insurrection. Instead, a speedy trial was pursued to take Trump off the ballot. By failing to giveTrump his rights to due process, the Supreme Court of Colorado is negatively impacting Trump without giving him a fair chance to make his case. Thus, at least until Trump is given a shot to defend himself, he should not yet be taken off the ballot in 2024.
Please join us for our debate on 1/8/24 at 7pm in Scott Hall 201!
"Donald Trump Signs The Pledge" by Michael Vadon is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.