Maine Becomes 2nd State to Disqualify Trump From Ballot

Maine’s secretary of state said Thursday that former President Trump was ineligible to be on the state’s primary ballot under the 14th Amendment, becoming the second state to take such action.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, said she had concluded that Trump “over the course of several months and culminating on January 6, 2021, used a false narrative of election fraud to inflame his supporters and direct them to the Capitol to prevent certification of the 2020 election and the peaceful transfer of power.”

In the 34-page decision, she also concluded that Trump “was aware of the likelihood for violence and at least initially supported its use given he both encouraged it with incendiary rhetoric and took no timely action to stop it.”

The Colorado Supreme Court ruled that Trump should be barred from its primary ballot for the same reasons last week. An appeal to that case is expected to be heard by the Supreme Court.

The Maine decision marks the first time a state official has removed a presidential candidate via the 14th Amendment, as the Colorado decision was made by a court.

“I do not reach this conclusion lightly. Democracy is sacred,” Bellows said.

“I am mindful that no Secretary of State has ever deprived a presidential candidate of ballot access based on Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment,” she wrote. “I am also mindful, however, that no presidential candidate has ever before engaged in insurrection.”

The Trump campaign denounced the decision Thursday, attacking Bellows as a “virulent leftist and a hyper-partisan Biden-supporting Democrat.”

“We are witnessing, in real-time, the attempted theft of an election and the disenfranchisement of the American voter,” Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said. “Make no mistake, these partisan election interference efforts are a hostile assault on American democracy.”

Other states have turned down similar challenges to Trump’s ballot qualifications.

In Minnesota, the state supreme court rejected 14th Amendment claims as untimely, and requested objectors wait until the general election to contest Trump’s candidacy.

In Michigan, a state court ruled Wednesday that its Secretary of State did not have the authority to make the determination to whether Trump violated the 14th Amendment.

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