Effort to remove Trump from Massachusetts ballot moves forward
One of the lead attorneys behind an effort to declare Donald Trump ineligible to appear on the Massachusetts state ballot disputed the claim that the former president will have his name put before voters in March regardless of any legal outcomes here.
Attorney Shannon Liss-Riordan, who alongside a liberal advocacy group filed two challenges this month looking to bump Trump off the ballot because of his role in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, said ballot printing deadlines and logistical concerns — both issues raised by Secretary of State William Galvin — are “no exception to the Constitution.”
“If we’re successful in our challenge, then Donald Trump will not appear on the ballot,” Liss-Riordan told the Herald on Saturday. “There is no exception to the Constitution for logistical issues regarding printing. If we win our objection, something will have to be figured out. Either the ballots will have to be reprinted or there are other processes that have been used, for instance, when a candidate dies before the election.”
The challenges filed by Liss-Riordan and Free Speech for People are set for a pre-hearing on Thursday in Boston before the Massachusetts State Ballot Law Commission, which will have the option to schedule a future meeting or dismiss the challenges, according to Galvin’s office.
But Galvin has said even if the challenges are successful, Trump will still appear on the Massachusetts presidential primary ballot because of printing timelines and the process by which state parties submit names for ballot placement.
Eligibility to serve in office is a different matter, Galvin said.
“If for whatever reason the Democratic Party wanted to put (former President Barack) Obama or some other ineligible person, clearly ineligible person on the ballot, they could. But it wouldn’t mean that they’d be automatically eligible to be serving again,” Galvin previously told the Herald.
Trump’s name is set to appear fifth on the Republican presidential primary ballot after Galvin drew candidates’ names at random earlier this month.
Liss-Riordan does not agree that Trump’s name on the ballot is a certainty.
“Obviously, ultimately, the U.S. Supreme Court may have the final word on this all together, but this is not Secretary Galvin’s call. He makes a decision of who’s on the ballot in the first instance, but he doesn’t make the final decision,” Liss-Riordan said.
Galvin’s office said Wednesday it had started mailing ballot applications to the 4.9 million registered voters in Massachusetts ahead of the March 5 presidential primaries.
The hearing next week comes as the U.S. Supreme Court has decided to weigh in on the matter, scheduling arguments in February over a Colorado ruling that bumped Trump off the state’s ballot using a provision of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.
The timeline for the challenges in Massachusetts will see a final outcome here before the U.S. Supreme Court makes a ruling, Liss-Riordan said.
Liss-Riordan said the commission must make a final decision by Jan. 29 at 5 p.m.
The Thursday pre-hearing will likely feature procedural discussions, Liss-Riordan said. A full hearing on the challenges could not start before Jan. 22 even though a decision must be handed down a week later, Liss-Riordan said.
“The reason that we need to press forward even though the U.S. Supreme Court granted cert in the Colorado case is because there is this very specific timeframe under Massachusetts law. So we can’t just wait to see what the Supreme Court does with Colorado,” Liss-Riordan told the Herald in a phone interview.
Free Speech for People and Liss-Riordan argue Trump should be kept off the Massachusetts Republican primary ballot because he violated a Civil War-era clause that bars from office anyone who took an oath to uphold the Constitution but engaged in an “insurrection or rebellion” against it.
The group is representing individual voters, including former Boston Acting Mayor Kim Janey, who asked the commission to “abide by Section 3 of the 14th Amendment and bar Trump from appearing on the state ballot.”
Challenges to Trump’s ballot eligibility have been filed across the United States, and only Maine and Colorado have removed the former president, who is also accused of trying to overturn the 2020 election results, from their ballots.
The Oregon Supreme Court declined to wade into a challenge to Trump’s eligibility filed in the state, effectively keeping him on the ballot.
The Massachusetts State Ballot Law Commission typically has five members but, at the moment, only three spots are filled.
Retired Judge Francis Crimmins Jr., a Republican, chairs the commission, and former state Sen. Joe Boncore, a Democrat, and Attorney Joseph Eisenstadt, a Democrat, are also members.
Materials from the Associated Press were used in this report.
from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/OnaoZHe
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