It remains legally unclear whether there is a realistic ability to disqualify former President Donald Trump from the ballot under the 14th Amendment, which has a provision barring insurrectionists from serving in public office. However, former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance outlined what it could look like on MSNBC Friday evening.
The key instructive example that anchor Chris Hayes started out with was Couy Griffin, the New Mexico commissioner who helped storm the Capitol on January 6 and was disqualified from serving in that state by the court system there.
"So what's interesting there, Joyce, is that the state law provided the avenue to make the claim," said Hayes. "New Mexico law says, you can actually — a citizen can sue if they believe in officeholder is not eligible. All of this is going to come down to different sort of state law questions ... but one thing I have seen raised — and I'm curious what you think in the sort of constitutional matter is — that it would be one thing if you had someone who was, say, convicted of seditious conspiracy, like the individuals we talked about earlier this evening, who, a jury of their peers found guilty, right? Of something, essentially, akin to insurrection. But, in the absence of that, you can't just do this willy-nilly. What do you think?"
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"I think that that is the key point," agreed Vance. "New Mexico had a statute on the books that provided for a process. The Constitution creates this barrier, and then, in Section 5, it says, and Congress can pass any laws necessary. So, the problem that we have is that there is really a dearth of laws here that advise the court, from the citizenry, on how to implement this prohibition on people holding office after participating in a sort of behavior. That is not to say that it can't be done, though. Section 3 appears in the Constitution itself. And so, strict constructionists would argue, with some force — and some of them have recently — that this is, in some sense, self-executing, that you don't need a mechanism."
"Right," said Hayes.
"But Chris, to your initial point, it's clear what you do have to have his process," added Vance. "You can't just have an individual decision to strip someone off the ballot. Secretary of State Shenna Bellows in Maine explains how careful and thorough they are. And if a candidate does not like their decision, then they can go forward and challenge. That's how a process like this would have to work."
Watch the video below or at the link right here.
Joyce Vance on the process of disqualifying Trumpwww.youtube.com
