How a controversial Supreme Court ruling quietly inflicted long-term damage: legal analyst

The U.S. Supreme Court's immunity ruling in early July has inspired so much debate and discussion that it has overshadowed another controversial Trump-related ruling handed down by the justices five months earlier: Trump v. Anderson.

In Anderson, the High Court struck down a Colorado Supreme Court ruling that excluded Trump from the state's ballot based on Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment. Under Section 3, somebody who has engaged in "insurrection" is ineligible to run for office — and the Colorado justices believed that the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol Building disqualified Trump.

But the Roberts Court disagreed, ruling that Trump couldn't be excluded from the Colorado ballot or any others. And two weeks before the 2024 election, Trump has a good chance of being elected president a second time. Polls are showing a very close, nail-biting race between Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris.

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In a biting article published by MSNBC on October 22, legal journalist Jordan Rubin argued that the High Court failed the U.S. miserably in Anderson — and that Trump shouldn't even be on the ballot.

"With former President Donald Trump on the precipice of possibly becoming president again," Rubin laments, "let's recall that he’s on the 2024 ballot thanks partly to the Supreme Court. I'm not talking about the ruling granting him broad criminal immunity, though the Roberts Court's handling of that appeal helped Trump push off a trial in the federal election interference case — possibly forever, if he wins the election and deploys his reacquired presidential power to crush it."

Rubin continues, "I'm talking about another Jan. 6-related appeal from the last Supreme Court term, one that more directly positioned the Republican to take office again: Trump v. Anderson. It was there that the justices reversed the Colorado Supreme Court's decision to keep the former president from the ballot."

Rubin argues that the Roberts Court did the U.S. a huge disservice in Anderson, allowed Trump to stay on the Colorado ballot despite having "engaged in" insurrection on January 6, 2021.

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"Look no further than the Trump-backed violence of Jan. 6," Rubin writes. "So, what about the 'plain consequences,' to use the chief justice's concerned phrase, of an oath-breaking insurrectionist potentially running the country again, this time knowing he'd have broad criminal immunity heading into a second term? That consequence apparently was not 'daunting' enough to move this court."

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