NYT: Tracking Efforts to Remove Trump From the 2024 Ballot
By Lazaro Gamio, Mitch Smith and Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs
Updated Jan. 31, 2023+
Formal challenges to Donald J. Trump’s presidential candidacy have been filed in at least 35 states, according to a New York Times review of court records and other documents.
Mr. Trump was disqualified from the primary ballots in Colorado and Maine, but he has appealed and is likely to appear on ballots in both states. The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear oral arguments in the Colorado appeal on Feb. 8 in a case that could determine Mr. Trump's eligibility for the ballot nationally.
The ballot challenges focus on whether Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election defeat make him ineligible to hold the presidency again. Those cases are based on a largely untested clause of a constitutional amendment enacted after the Civil War that disqualifies government officials who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” from holding office.
Of the 35 states where challenges have been filed, President Biden carried 22 in 2020 and Mr. Trump carried 13. Mr. Trump also won a single electoral vote in Maine, which splits its votes by congressional district.
The Colorado Supreme Court and Maine’s secretary of state, Shenna Bellows, each found Mr. Trump ineligible under that provision. Mr. Trump, who is leading in Republican primary polls, has appealed those decisions, and his campaign has described the attempts to remove him from the ballot as unconstitutional and antidemocratic.
A judge in Maine stayed Mr. Trump’s disqualification and ordered Ms. Bellows, a Democrat, to revisit the issue after the U.S. Supreme Court rules in the Colorado case. Ms. Bellows appealed the judge’s order, but her appeal was dismissed.
Several judges have dismissed cases at the request of Mr. Trump or the request of the person who filed the challenge. The Michigan and Minnesota Supreme Courts have each said Mr. Trump is eligible to appear on the primary ballot in those states.
Status of challenges in each state
Reporting was contributed by Mike Baker, Nicholas Fandos, Christina T. Henry, Shawn Hubler and Jenna Russell.
Correction:
Jan. 15, 2024
An earlier version of a promotional image for this article mislabeled the state of Indiana as Illinois. A ballot challenge is pending with the State Board of Elections in Illinois, not Indiana.