Judge Misha Westby of the Albany County District Court in Wyoming has rejected a motion to remove Donald Trump from the state’s 2024 presidential ballot. The judge stated that Trump is ineligible to serve a second term as president under the 14th Amendment. The decision was made on Thursday and the case was dismissed without prejudice. Harmeet Dhillon, a conservative lawyer, shared the verdict on X (formerly Twitter) and expressed disappointment with yet another 14th Amendment lawsuit being rejected. The lawsuit was filed by Tim Newcomb, a retired attorney, against Trump and Senator Cynthia Lummis on November 1, 2023.
It sought to “preclude the names of Mr. Trump and Ms. Lummis from appearing on Wyoming ballots…and award reasonable attorney fees and costs incurred in prosecuting this action.”
According to recent polls, Trump is widely favored to secure the Republican presidential nomination in 2024. However, his candidacy has already faced setbacks in Colorado and Maine, where he has been removed from the primary ballots based on the 14th Amendment. Despite these decisions, Trump’s team is currently appealing both cases to the Supreme Court.
If the Supreme Court were to uphold either of these verdicts, it would have an unprecedented impact on the Republican presidential primary campaign, causing immediate destabilization. This would be an unprecedented event in modern American history.
Section 3 of the 14th Amendment states that individuals who have previously taken an oath to “support the Constitution of the United States” and have engaged in insurrection or rebellion are ineligible to hold any office, whether civil or military, in the country. Trump’s critics argue that his alleged involvement in attempting to alter the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, including his alleged role in the January 6 storming of Congress, qualifies as an insurrection. Consequently, they believe he is disqualified from serving as president again.
On December 19, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled by a 4-3 majority that Trump cannot appear on the state’s primary ballot due to his actions surrounding January 6, 2021, which they deemed as “overt, voluntary, and direct participation in the insurrection.”
Just days later, the Maine Secretary of State also concluded that Trump “used a false narrative of election fraud to inflame his supporters and direct them to the Capitol to prevent certification of the 2020 election and the peaceful transfer of power.”
The Trump campaign was quick to respond, stating: “Make no mistake, these partisan election interference efforts are a hostile assault on American democracy. Biden and the Democrats simply do not trust the American voter in a free and fair election and are now relying on the force of government institutions to protect their grip on power.”
During a recent interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Alina Habba, a lawyer representing Trump, expressed her belief that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh will support the 45th president in the Colorado 2024 ballot decision. Habba specifically mentioned Kavanaugh as one of the nine justices who should vote in favor of Trump, particularly in relation to the potential overturning of the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling from December, which prevented the former president from running for office in the state.
“It should be a slam dunk in the Supreme Court. I have faith in them. People like Kavanaugh, who the president fought for, who the president went through hell to get into place, he’ll step up,” Habba said. “Those people will step up not because they’re pro-Trump, but because they’re pro-law, because they’re pro-fairness, and the law on this is very clear.”