Michigan Supreme Court Rejects Trump Disqualification

The Michigan Supreme Court in late December blocked an effort to remove Donald Trump from the state’s GOP primary ballot, just two weeks after the Michigan Court of Appeals also rejected the effort, NBC News reported.

In its December 27 order, the state’s high court declined to hear the case which argued that Trump should be kept off of the ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which prevents anyone who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” after swearing an oath to the Constitution from holding public office again.

The high court said it was “not persuaded that the questions presented should be reviewed by this court.”

The state Supreme Court’s decision comes shortly after the Michigan Court of Appeals also rejected challenges to Trump appearing on the primary ballot. In its 3-0 opinion, the appellate court cited Michigan law and argued that the decision on who is placed on a ballot is determined by individual candidates and the state’s political parties.

Courts in both Minnesota and Arizona also rejected similar efforts to remove Trump from their states’ primary ballots.

In November, the Minnesota Supreme Court dismissed a petition from a group of voters to keep Trump off of both the GOP primary and the general election ballots. The court ruled that Minnesota law did not prevent state parties from placing candidates on the primary ballot, even if the candidate is ineligible.

Earlier in December, the Colorado Supreme Court barred Trump from appearing on the state’s primary ballot with the majority of justices agreeing that the former president was disqualified under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.

In response to the Michigan Supreme Court’s decision, Trump said in a Truth Social post that the court “denied the Desperate Democrat attempt” to block him from the ballot, which he claimed was a “pathetic gambit to rig the Election.