The Colorado State Open Thread is for all those interested in news, views and to peruse what people from our great square(ish) state have to think about what’s going on here. The views brought forward are mine, but in the comments, all heck can and has sometimes broken loose — it is an open thread, after all, and I welcome whatever is on your minds. What is on my mind this evening? The state courthouse in downtown Denver, where there has been a trial starting last week about whether or not Donald Trump should be prevented from having his name on the ballot as a Republican candidate for President of the United States of America in next year’s Colorado primary.
I’m sure you have had multiple chances to catch up with most of the news about this trial, which was filed by the group CREW along with a few Republican and two Independent lawmakers of Colorado. To catch you up on a day-by-day summary, you can go to Colorado Politics' Court Crawl.
• What happens next? This week, the parties will submit their proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law, which Wallace will incorporate into her ruling. On Nov. 15, there will be closing arguments. That triggers a 48-hour window for Wallace to issue an order. The decision about Trump's eligibility to appear on next year's ballot will be appealable to the Colorado Supreme Court and, from there, the U.S. Supreme Court.
The current Secretary of State, Jena Griswold, has been named as a defendant in the case, as has TFG, since Jena has said she wants a court to decide this, not her office as an elected, political position, which, imo, is entirely proper. From coloradonewsline.com/...
Griswold is an outspoken critic of Trump who has said the former president did “incite an insurrection and attack our democracy.” But she is named as a defendant in the lawsuit because she “has not committed to excluding Trump from the presidential ballot,” the plaintiffs wrote. Griswold has called the 14th Amendment claims “not a cut-and-dry case,” and said she wants a court to weigh in on the matter.
One of Trump’s attorneys in the Colorado case, Scott Gessler, is a former Republican secretary of state. While holding that office, he defended his authority in 2012 to bar constitutionally ineligible candidates from the Colorado ballot, in response to a lawsuit brought by Abdul Hassan, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Guyana who sought to make the presidential ballot in 2012.
That case eventually produced a ruling by the Denver-based Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, in which future Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch affirmed that “a state’s legitimate interest in protecting the integrity and practical functioning of the political process permits it to exclude from the ballot candidates who are constitutionally prohibited from assuming office.”
Gorsuch’s ruling in Hassan v. Colorado is cited by CREW’s attorneys in the complaint against Trump and Griswold, and has been identified by the group as one reason it viewed Colorado as a “good venue” in which to bring its first 14th Amendment case against Trump.
Beyond this single case, there are many issues going on in Colorado that may be on your minds. Please comment down below and let us know what you’re thinking about. The weather? The Broncos not losing this past weekend? The Elijah McClain trials of police and EMS personnel? A play or movie you have seen recently? Maybe there’s even an election where you would like to make a last minute appeal for votes for your candidate? Maybe you have thoughts on the beginning of Mountain Standard Time again.
The floor is yours...