If Trump is kept off ballots, Republican states could bar Biden, too, Missouri’s Ashcroft says

The U.S. Supreme Court is reviewing a Colorado Supreme Court ruling that former President Trump’s name could not appear on the state’s Republican primary ballot because his actions leading up to the assault on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, amounted to insurrection.

Ashcroft’s comments follow his Friday post to X, formerly Twittter: “While I expect the Supreme Court to overturn this, if not, Secretaries of State will step in & ensure the new legal standard for @realDonaldTrump applies equally to @JoeBiden!”

Reached at his home Saturday, Ashcroft said if the U.S. Supreme Court does not rule in favor of Trump, “We will have further conversations, I’m sure.”

“I’m not in favor of going down this path,” Ashcroft said. “But we will go down this path, it’s inevitable, if the Supreme Court does not stop this.”

Ashcroft is in a tight race to be the Republican nominee for governor this year, running against Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe and state Sen. Bill Eigel, R-Weldon Spring. The primary will be held Aug. 6.

Response from Democrats was swift. State Rep. Crystal Quade, D-Springfield, who is running for governor, described Ashcroft’s statements as “clear and utter nonsense.”

Matthew Patterson, executive director of the Missouri Democratic Party, said, “Secretary Ashcroft’s implication that he would have grounds to remove President Biden from the ballot only further demonstrates that he is unserious about making Missourians’ lives better and remains committed to sowing chaos and dysfunction for his own political gain.”

If the Supreme Court court does decide that Trump’s name could legally be kept from the ballot, Republican secretaries of state might seek to bar President Joe Biden for reasons including allowing an “invasion” of immigrants into the country, Ashcroft said.

As Missouri’s secretary of state, “My job is to be the referee of the administration of elections, my job is not to put the thumb down on either side,” Ashcroft said. “The rules will be applied equally. I just hope they will not be the rules of Colorado and Maine.”

Maine’s secretary of state, a Democrat, ruled last month that Trump could not be on that state’s Republican primary ballot for the same reason. And in Illinois last week, a group of five voters making similar arguments filed a petition with the state’s board of elections to keep Trump off the Illinois primary election ballot in March.

The U.S. Supreme Court announced on Friday it would review the Colorado court decision, made last month. 

Article IV of the Constitution says that the United States will protect the states from invasion, but does not prohibit officials from holding office if they fail to do so.

The 14th amendment to the U.S. Constitution bars anyone from being in Congress, the military and federal and state offices if they have taken an oath to support the Constitution and “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same.”

Scholars agree the provision was written to keep people who had fought for the Confederacy during the Civil War from holding office. But amendments to the Constitution are widely understood to be the law of the land in all circumstances.

Ashcroft, who is a lawyer, said in his view the decisions in Colorado and Maine were partisan and not supported by the Constitution or the rule of law. If upheld, he said, political parties would be able to keep their opponents off the ballots for not just president, but for all elected positions.

In addition, Ashcroft said, Trump has never been found guilty of insurrection in any court, so acting on the presumption that he engaged in insurrection without a trial deprives him of due process.

Ashcroft said he plans to file an amicus brief to the U.S. Supreme Court.