Illinois Judge Orders Trump Removed from State’s Ballot

AP Photo/Charles Krupa

A judge in Illinois ruled on Wednesday that former President Donald Trump should be removed from the state’s presidential ballot because he allegedly engaged in an insurrection.

Judge Tracie Porter of the Circuit Court of Cook County ruled that “based on engaging in insurrection on January 6, 2021…his name should be removed from the ballot.”

Porter stayed her decision to give Trump’s attorneys a chance to appeal.

The Colorado Supreme Court and Maine’s secretary of state have also ruled that Trump be barred from this year’s ballot. All three entities agreed that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment prohibits Trump and other alleged insurrectionists from holding federal office.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the Colorado case, with the justices appearing poised to reinstate Trump on the state’s ballot. Such a decision would have the knock-on effect of requiring his reinstatement in Maine and Illinois if in fact Trump is ultimately removed from the ballot in the Prairie State.

After losing the 2020 election, Trump tried to pressure officials in states he lost to overturn the results. When that failed, he urged his vice president to refuse to certify the results in Congress. When the vice president declined, a violent mob stormed the Capitol and sought to subvert the election as Trump reportedly watched on television and ignored pleas for help.

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment states:

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.

The 14th Amendment was ratified three years after the Civil War. Section 3 was designed most immediately to prevent former Confederates from holding office in the United States government.

Trump is the runaway frontrunner to win the Republican presidential nomination.