 Well, the Supreme Court just handed Trump another major victory. So the question was whether or not Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution gives states the authority to remove Trump from the ballot. Now before we get to their ruling, I just want to take a moment to read you that particular provision of the Constitution because while some portions of the Constitution might be vague or up for interpretation, I think that this part is pretty clear. It reads quote, No person shall be a senator or representative in Congress or elector of President and Vice President or hold any office, civil or military under the United States or under any state who, having previously taken an oath as a member of Congress or as an officer of the United States or as a member of any state legislature or as an executive or judicial officer of any state to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. Now it doesn't say whether or not said insurrectionist has to be convicted, nor does it outline the appropriate mechanisms to actually block said insurrectionists from holding power. So in theory, it seems like Colorado was well within their right to remove Trump from the ballot. Right? Well, apparently not. Because in a unanimous decision, including Clarence Thomas, who didn't recuse himself by the way, the Supreme Court said no. But five of the six conservative justices didn't just stop there because Mark Joseph Stern of Slate explains, quote, they went much further than the case required, announcing an entirely new rule that Congress alone, through a particular kind of legislation, may enforce the constitutional bar of insurrectionists holding office. As the three liberal justices pointed out in a separate opinion that glows white hot with indignation, the majority's overreach attempts to insulate all alleged insurrectionists from future challenges to their holding federal office. They are, of course, correct. After this decision, it is impossible to imagine a federal candidate up to and including the president ever being disqualified from assuming office because of their participation in an insurrection. Yeah, that sounds kind of bad. It seems like maybe we should have some type of mechanism to protect democracy from insurrectionists. The Supreme Court says we don't really need that since the person who wants to get in power, that's an insurrectionist as one that we support. Now keep in mind that one legal argument against removing Trump from the ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment is that it was done before he was convicted. And even though it doesn't necessarily say that an insurrectionist has to be convicted to be disqualified, it was argued that that should be the standard, which is an argument. I don't agree with that, but it's one argument to make. But the Supreme Court is taking it so much further than that. So even if he is convicted, he still cannot be removed from the ballot because that is Congress's duty for some reason according to the Supreme Court. And that is the core of their disagreement with the liberals here and Amy Coney Barrett who agrees with the liberals that the conservatives or the other conservatives took it too far. Now MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin explained this disagreement between the liberals and Amy Coney Barrett and the conservatives in what I thought was a really concise way. So let's hear from her. It's still you have four justices concurring in the judgment, meaning they agree with the result, but also concurring separately and saying that the way that they disagree with the majority or the percurium opinion is that they don't feel that they needed to decide that Congress is the exclusive enforcement mechanism, both Justice Barrett who is concurring only for herself and then Justice Sotomayor, Kagan and Jackson concurring separately say they don't need to decide anything more than this not a right that belongs to the states, but all four of them casting doubt on the idea that the exclusive mechanism of enforcement here is congressionally enacted legislation. That's important because one other way that you could find that someone is disqualified is through, for example, a federal court ruling or you could find that someone is an insurrectionist through their criminal through criminal liability. So there are a number of different ways that I think these justices are raising. Section three could have been enforced and yet the percurium decision says not only does the power not belong to the states, you have to have Congress act affirmatively in order to disqualify someone from the ballot. In other words, insurrectionists are free to run for public office even if they are convicted so long as Congress doesn't take action against them. That is so wild to me. The conservative justices decided to add that extra part because they know Congress in its current makeup isn't going to actually vote to disqualify Trump, meaning that the outcome of his federal cases will have absolutely no bearing on his eligibility. Unlike the issue of abortion, this actually isn't a states rights issue. Fuck states rights all of a sudden when it comes to protecting Donald Trump. That's what our Supreme Court just told us. Now to be clear, the liberal justices are also wrong, but their fear is that opening the door to states disqualifying candidates sets a dangerous precedent because what if a Republican controlled state, for example, wants to disqualify a leftist candidate who is at some sort of a protest? I mean, we all saw how the Republicans in Congress called Rashida Tlaib's participation in the ceasefire protest an insurrection. Now I understand that fear, but to that I say insurrection has a very specific definition and Trump's behavior unquestionably meets the criteria outlined in section three of the fourteenth amendment, whereas Rashida Tlaib in this example does not. I mean, you can't just call something an insurrection and get someone disqualified. There are actual standards and guidelines to follow. So even though the liberal justices are worried about the effect that this would have on democracy and I don't blame them for that, I'd argue that the bigger danger here is allowing insurrectionist autocrats to run with impunity. And that's the bigger risk. I mean, you have to have some way to stop people who try to overthrow the government from getting power again. But they're saying, no, it's fine. We're just, we're cool with that. We're going to let them run again. Doesn't matter. But the five conservative justices took that flawed reasoning of the liberal justices and they took it so much more further in what is just a completely bizarre response as explained by Mark Joseph Sturm. Now first, he explains in his article that they used precedent from the Griffin's case, which is widely discredited, which who cares, you know, they're they're not trying to even pretend to be principled anymore. But more importantly, he adds, quote, it is bizarre to claim that the insurrection clause requires enabling legislation by Congress when the remainder of the fourteenth amendment indeed all three amendments ratified after the Civil War is self executing, meaning it does not require congressional action for enforcement. Everyone agrees that Congress need not pass a lot to ensure that all persons have due process, equal protection and freedom from enslavement. Why the liberals wondered, did the majority create a special rule for the insurrection clause alone? They added that the clause does mention congressional action, but only to say that Congress may lift a disqualification by two thirds vote, quote, it is hard to understand why the Constitution would require a congressional supermajority to remove a disqualification if a simple majority could nullify section three's operation by repealing or declining to pass implementing legislation. Yeah, and that's exactly right. It is so comical at this point. And the reason why they're doing this is obvious. It's because they're running cover for Trump period. We don't have to keep pretending as if these far right ideologues reach any decision based on principle, because that's not what they're doing. That's not what they do in any case, and that's not what they did here. This is a rogue court that's given up any pretense that they're following some sort of a consistent legal philosophy in order to interpret the Constitution. They're just doing what they want and then justifying their political decisions with some half baked legal explanation after the fact. And it wouldn't have mattered if he did, but I still have to mention again that Thomas did not recuse himself from this case, even though his wife was part of that insurrectionist plot to overthrow the US government. I mean, what a joke. They know that they can do what they want because there's no mechanism to hold them accountable for their corruption or their political decisions that they keep making. And if you thought that the reasoning here was sketchy, we need to just zoom out for a moment and look at the broader context here to get a better grasp of how brazen this court is with them running cover for Trump. So Stern continues Monday's case. Trump v. Anderson is proof positive that the Supreme Court can act at rapid speed to resolve a dispute of national importance, at least when Trump's own interests are under threat. The Colorado Supreme Court disqualified Trump on December 19th. Scotis took up the case on January 5th and heard arguments on February 8th. Now, less than a month later, the justices have resolved the case in Trump's favor. The court's ultra accelerated consideration of Anderson sits in sharp contrast with its treatment of Trump's claim of absolute immunity in his criminal trial over January 6th, which the justices have by comparison. Slow walk to the point that it appears unlikely the former president could face trial before November. This disparity alone may provide a clue that there is something other than law of foot in these cases. Precisely, they're not even trying to be subtle. And them taking up the Trump immunity case is another huge win for Trump, even if he loses. Because on one hand, as Thomas McAllister of Slade explains in this article, if they argue that the president has absolute immunity, they're basically paving the way for a Trump dictatorship where he's able to abuse power within punitive. But I mean, if they rule against him and confirm that presidents don't actually have absolute immunity, which they do not, or at least they're not supposed to. Well, it's still a win for Trump, either way, because they've successfully delayed the case against him enough in order to shield him from any electoral consequences of his criminality or of a potential condition. So the highest court in the land is totally compromised and they're doing everything in their power to make sure that Trump comes out on top. And this is why I was skeptical about the prospect of Trump facing any accountability for his numerous crimes, even though it looked pretty bad against them. I mean, 91 charges across four indictments. That is very substantial to put it mildly. But again, we have a two-tiered justice system where people in power are basically free to commit crimes with impunity because other people in power want to protect them so they can be criminals too. And aside from their attempt to shield Trump from accountability, let's not forget that they're also rolling back our civil rights and they might consolidate their power again soon, depending on the outcome of the case pertaining to the Chevron doctrine. But more on that in a different day. It's just untenable. What they're doing is untenable and damaging democracy and Democrats need to do something to rein them in immediately before they destroy our country even more than they already have.