'Seismic' Trump insurrectionist ruling opens door for Supreme Court surprise: legal expert

The Colorado judge who handed Donald Trump a win by keeping him on the state's ballot may have set things in motion for the Supreme Court to help the plaintiffs, a former prosecutor said on Saturday.

Former federal prosecutor Harry Litman appeared on MSNBC's Yasmin Vossoughian Reports, where he was asked about the Colorado decision, which kept the ex-president on the state ballot but affirmed that he participated in insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021.

The headline of the decision, according to Litman, is that Trump engaged in insurrection.

"No other court had done that. If you think about it, it is a step on the road, if we get to the end of the road, that had to happen," Litman said. "This is what trial courts do. She held a one-week-long trial. She considered evidence from both sides. If this issue were in a higher court, they might opine on what it means to have an insurrection, what it means to engage in. They could not make the ultimate finding that now has been made."

He added that the issue will now go to the court of appeal.

"It is true that, at the end, she blinked ... on this officer issue," Litman added. "I understood the Colorado secretary of state's disappointment, but it is a very close textual reading. It's probably a weak one, but it's not crazy."

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The "bigger point," Litman added, is that "a court of appeal can easily say we agree with everything she said, but we disagree with this final interpretation of what it means to be an officer."

This argument "had to happen" and the Supreme Court must embrace ultimately embrace the idea for it to go anywhere, Litman said. He noted that this ruling sets the stage for that potential. Unless this ruling occurred, the issue wouldn't have made it "out of the gate," he added.

"This is the necessary and real seismic ruling. Yes, he engaged -- his first amendment claim is wrong -- in an insurrection. This is 95% of what an opinion disqualifying him would look like and the extra 5% is something that a higher court could do, where as they couldn't do the part that she has now done. They could not adjudicate it on the facts."

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