The plaintiffs are a bipartisan group of voters and activists who say Trump should be barred from running under the insurrection clause of the U.S. Constitution.
They are challenging a Michigan Court of Appeals decision issued Thursday that said Trump cannot be booted from the state’s February primary ballot. But the court said the question can be re-visited if and when Trump becomes the Republican nominee.
Plaintiffs’ attorney Mark Brewer, a former Michigan Democratic Party chair, said that is no way to run a presidential election.
“It’s just a prescription for chaos,” he told Michigan Public Radio.
“The Court of Appeals decision not only allows an insurrectionist like Trump to be on the ballot, but it opens the door to all kinds of mischief,” he said. “Suppose a political party said we’re not going to put a Black candidate on the ballot. We’re not going to put a woman on the ballot. We’re not going to put a gay candidate on the ballot. Under the Court of Appeals decision, no voter could bring a lawsuit to say that’s wrong, that’s illegal, parties can’t act like that.”
Brewer said he expects the appeal will be filed Monday.
The Michigan Supreme Court would have to move quickly if it takes the case. The deadline to make absentee ballots available for the presidential primary is mid-January.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment. But in a statement released following Thursday’s ruling, campaign spokesman Steven Cheung called the argument “a desperate attempt to interfere in the election via a bad-faith interpretation of the 14th Amendment.
President Trump remains undefeated against these frivolous legal claims and has never been in a stronger position to win next year’s election.”
