September 7, 2032
Read the full text of four documents making the compelling case for the disqualification of Donald Trump from holding public office as dictated by Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment.
UPDATE: To follow all current litigation seeking to disqualify Trump under the Fourteenth Amendment click on Lawfare’s “Trump Disqualification Tracker.”
The Sweep and Force of Section Three
Excerpted from “The Constitution Prohibits Trump From Ever Being President Again,” by J. Michael Luttig, a former federal judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, and Laurence H. Tribe, the Carl M. Loeb University Professor of Constitutional Law Emeritus at Harvard University, as published in The Atlantic on August 19, 2023: “The former president’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, and the resulting attack on the U.S. Capitol, place him squarely within the ambit of the disqualification clause, and he is therefore ineligible to serve as president ever again. The most pressing constitutional question facing our country at this moment, then, is whether we will abide by this clear command of the Fourteenth Amendment’s disqualification clause.
We were immensely gratified to see that a richly researched article soon to be published in an academic journal has recently come to the same conclusion that we had and is attracting well-deserved attention outside a small circle of scholars—including Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and Anjani Jain of the Yale School of Management, whose encouragement inspired us to write this piece. The evidence laid out by the legal scholars William Baude and Michael Stokes Paulsen in “The Sweep and Force of Section Three,” available as a preprint, is momentous. Sooner or later, it will influence, if not determine, the course of American constitutional history—and American history itself.”
The full text of Baude and Paulsen’s powerful and influential article explaining how Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment disqualifies Trump from ever holding office again can be viewed in your browser in the scrollable reader below or by clicking on the link below the reader titled “The Sweep and Force of Section Three.” Clicking the “Download” button allows the full text of the report to be downloaded to your device. You can also share this post on Twitter and Facebook.
The following links are to resources and cases referenced in or relevant to The Sweep and Force of Section Three and disqualification in general: January 6 Committee Report, Griffin’s Case (1869), New Mexico v. Griffin (9.6.22) (A case brought by CREW against Couy Griffin, a January 6 insurrectionist; CREW won the case and Griffin was removed from office as a County Commissioner and disqualified from ever holding office again pursuant to Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment); Anderson v. Jena Griswold, CO Secretary of State (This link is to a hard hitting complaint filed by CREW on September 6, 2023, seeking to prevent Trump from appearing on the Colorado ballot pursuant to to Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment).
CREW – Disqualified
Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted after the Civil War as a mechanism to protect American democracy from those disloyal to the Constitution. It bars from office any person who swore an “oath … to support the Constitution of the United States” as a federal or state officer and then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same,” unless Congress removes the disqualification by a two-thirds vote of each house. The attack on the Capitol was not a spontaneous event. It was the culmination of a multi-part scheme by Donald Trump and his allies to use lies, intimidation, coercion and ultimately violence to keep Trump in office. By leading these unprecedented efforts to subvert the Constitution and American democracy, Trump disqualified himself under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment from holding any federal or state office, including the presidency. As CREW lays out in its recent report, provided here in its full text, there is overwhelming evidence that Donald Trump is disqualified from office under the Constitution and that this disqualification is self-executing and automatic.
The full text of CREW’s monumental and compelling report explaining how Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment disqualifies Trump from ever holding office again can be viewed in your browser in the scrollable reader below or by clicking on the link below the reader titled “CREW – Disqualified.” Clicking the “Download” button allows the full text of the report to be downloaded to your device. You can also share this post on Twitter and Facebook.
As CREW is a frequent and fierce litigant for voting rights and other issues central to maintaining our democracy it will be critically important to follow their progress regarding their expressed intent to use the disqualification clause to persuade state officials not to place Trump on the ballot and to litigate this issue as necessary. These links will be helpful for checking in on CREW’s efforts: CREW To Pursue Disqualification, CREW Letter To Donald Trump Stating He is Disqualified, CREW – Legal Experts Agree Trump Is Disqualified. CREW has already won one disqualification lawsuit and recently launched another. Follow these links to court documents in CREW disqualification litigation: New Mexico v. Griffin (9.6.22) (A case brought by CREW against Couy Griffin, a January 6 insurrectionist; CREW won the case and Griffin was removed from office as a County Commissioner and disqualified from ever holding office again pursuant to Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment).
BREAKING NEWS: On September 6, 2023, CREW filed a hard hitting lawsuit against Jena Griswold, the Colorado Secretary of State, (the lawsuit also names Donald Trump as a defendant) seeking to prevent Trump from appearing on the Colorado ballot pursuant to to Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment. The full text of CREW’s petition can be found at this link: Anderson v. Jena Griswold, CO Secretary of State.
UPDATE: On November 17, 2023, Colorado District Court Judge Sarah B. Wallace issued a 102-page order finding against CREW and holding that Trump is not disqualified from holding the office of President under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. The full text of the final ruling can be found at this link: https://democracy4all.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Anderson-v-Jena-Griswold-Final-Order-11.17.23.pdf
States Can Enforce Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment
Excerpted from the website of Free Speech For People: “Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment (the Insurrectionist Disqualification Clause) bars insurrectionists from public office. It is sometimes suggested that enforcing Section 3 against those involved in the January 6, 2021 insurrection–such as former president Donald Trump– would require new federal legislation. Free Speech For People has issued a report, co-written with Professor Gerard Magliocca of Indiana University law school, explaining why that is incorrect. To the contrary, states can enforce Section 3 without any new federal legislation–just as they regularly enforce other constitutional provisions and other sections of the Fourteenth Amendment itself.
As the report explains, state courts do not need permission from Congress to enforce the U.S. Constitution. For example, state courts regularly enforce the First Amendment and other provisions of the Bill of Rights. That is also true of the Fourteenth Amendment. Practically every day in every state, state courts enforce other parts of the Fourteenth Amendment–especially the Equal Protection Clause and the Due Process Clause. Indeed, states have been doing so since the Fourteenth Amendment was passed, including in some of the litigation that led to the Supreme Court’s celebrated 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision.
Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment is no different from the rest of the Fourteenth Amendment. Nothing in the text, original public meaning, or the Reconstruction-era history of Section 3’s implementation suggests that states need authorization from Congress to implement this part of the Constitution. To the contrary, the history of Reconstruction shows that Congress, state courts, and even ex-Confederate insurrectionists all understood Section 3 to apply without a federal enforcement statute; indeed, during Reconstruction state courts repeatedly enforced Section 3 in exactly that circumstance. Only one Reconstruction-era judicial decision (recently described as “confused and confusing” by a federal circuit judge) suggests otherwise, and this report explains why that decision was either erroneous or inapplicable to a state with a functioning state government.”
The full text of Free Speech For People’s insightful report explaining how Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment disqualifies Trump from ever holding office again can be viewed in your browser in the scrollable reader below or by clicking on the link below the reader titled “States Can Enforce 14th Amendment.” Clicking the “Download” button allows the full text of the report to be downloaded to your device. You can also share this post on Twitter and Facebook.
BREAKING NEWS: On September 12, 2023, Free Speech for People filed its own disqualification lawsuit, this one directed at Steve Simon, the Minnesota Secretary of State, seeking to prevent Trump from appearing on the Minnesota ballot pursuant to to Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment. The full text of Free Speech for People’s petition can be found at this link: Growe v. Steve Simon, Minnesota Secretary of State.
The Insurrection Bar to Office: Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment
Days after the history making raid on Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in search of documents illegally taken from the White House by the former president the Congressional Research Service updated and published a legal memorandum addressing the Disqualification Clause found in Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. The memorandum explains to whom it might apply, what activities could trigger a bar on holding office, and discusses possible mechanisms to implement it. While the memorandum lacks the depth and breadth of research and legal analysis of the preceding documents it is included here for completeness regarding this area of legal inquiry.
The full text of The Congressional Research Service memorandum, “The Insurrection Bar to Office: Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment,” can be viewed in your browser in the scrollable reader below or by clicking on the link below the reader titled “Insurrection Bar.” Clicking the “Download” button allows the full text of the opinion to be downloaded to your device. You can also share this post on Twitter and Facebook.
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