LIVE NOW: Legal ANALYSIS of TRUMP Ballot Ban SUPREME COURT Ruling

Live now on Sekulow, we have the legal analysis of the Trump ballot ban Supreme Court ruling 9-0. If you've heard it, a 9-0 victory at the Supreme Court for President Trump and our client who was a part of the case, the Colorado Republican State Committee. That includes then all three liberal justices of the Supreme Court. 9-0 that you cannot remove President Trump from the ballot as a state actor, whether that's a secretary of state or through a court system. The only way that could happen is if Congress were to pass new legislation giving some kind of power to the 14th Amendment, legislation that does not exist at this time and legislation with the divided Congress, I don't see existing at any time in the near future or ever. It was a full vindication in the sense that for future Presidents as well, Dan, which is so important here, though a lot of people aren't, you know, focused on the Trump side of this, but that future Presidents won't have to worry about what he went through and what we went through with all these states across the country having to battle back and spending significant resources just to make sure people would have the opportunity to vote for him.

Not that they would definitely vote for him, but then he would be on the ballot. No, the issue was can a state on its own initiative remove a candidate from running for President from their state ballot? And the answer by all nine justices, and I want to reemphasize this, all nine justices said no, you can't do that. Justice Roberts writes in the opinion, all nine members of the court agree with the result. Justice Barrett writes in her concurring opinion, all nine justices agree on the outcome of this case.

That is a message Americans should take home. Then the three concurring justices, which also agree with the opinion, Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson said to allow Colorado to take a Presidential candidate off the ballot under section three would imperil the framers visions of a federal government directly responsible to the people. So I want to send a message to the naysayers about the institutional credibility of the Supreme Court, to those that have talked negative about the Supreme Court of the United States or have said it's become a political partisan institution. There were pundits this morning saying this is going to fall down to some kind of political lines, Republican nominees and Democratic nominees.

None of that happened. On a case of great magnitude, this is a tremendous victory by the way, not just a victory for President Trump, but a victory for our electoral process. I would say it's the most significant case like this that we've ever handled and to have all nine justices issue what is called a per curiam opinion. That means the court is speaking. It's not a justice. It's up on the screen right now.

It says per curiam, the court, through the court. That sends a very powerful signal. We're going to break all of this down in the segments coming up. But I got to tell you something folks, the battle, this is a great victory and I don't want to take anything away from it. The battle has really just begun. First, we got to go in and get some states to stop.

We've got three cases we've got to get handled. But it is a resounding victory at the U.S. Supreme Court. As I said, unanimously ruling in our favor to stop the left's attempt to ban President Trump.

We'll get into the reaction in a minute. This is one of the biggest Supreme Court victories in the ACLJ's history. We represented the Colorado GOP in the case, winning a massive victory for the Constitution. But also, we protected the right, everyone's right to vote for the candidate of their choice.

The only way that we get these victories is through your support. But the legal work does not end here. First, the fight continues as we now have got the three remaining cases, we got to go back to court, file motions to dismiss and get those dismissed. And then immediately we are involved in the Presidential immunity case, which is another attempt to disqualify President Trump. That's also at the Supreme Court.

That's going on right now. So, we must defend the Constitution once again, and we need your support to do it. Go to ACLJ.org and have your tax deductible gift doubled during our Life and Liberty Drive.

Jordan? And folks, you know, this is, again, it's a critical time to support the work of the ACLJ during that Life and Liberty Drive. Again, to double the impact of your donation, to stand with us.

This is an opportunity. It shows you, you can still win 9-0 when you're on the side of the Constitution. And it's clear, even when the left tries to come against you in their courts, you can be victorious.

And that is why you always fight for your country, and for our elections, and for our system of government. Go to ACLJ.org, that's what we do, and donate today. And welcome back to Secio, a huge 9-0 victory. Unanimous decision at the U.S. Supreme Court, the ACLJ representing, as a party, the Colorado Republican State Committee won 9-0.

The Trump campaign won 9-0. You cannot have states using the 14th Amendment Section 3 to decide when they want to remove a candidate from either the primary or the general election. Now, it was a per curiam opinion. And, Dad, you talked about what the per curiam opinion was, which was by decision of the entire court in a unanimous agreement. But I know people are out there thinking, I haven't even seen it on Twitter, is the fact that it's not signed take any power away from it. No, no, no.

In fact... People want to know that. I think to the contrary, and Andy and I were talking about this before, per curiam means simply through the court. You had the rare situation where all the justices were speaking with one voice. And the one voice that they spoke with is because the Constitution makes Congress, rather than the states responsible for enforcing Section 3 against federal office holders and candidates, we reverse. In other words, the states can't do this. So I think to the contrary, I know some pundits are saying that, but, Andy, in reality, the fact that it's per curiam sends a more powerful signal.

Oh, absolutely does. Per curiam, as Jordan said, is a Latin term that means through the court. It's not authored by any particular justice or the chief justice, but it's put together by the input of all the justices.

And I think it gives it added impetus and added influence and added persuasiveness in that no one justice has spoken. And the court was not divided. It was a unanimous decision per curiam through all the court that the federal officers owe their existence and functions to the united voice of the whole, not a portion of the people, powers over their election.

I'm reading from the opinion. And qualifications must be specifically delegated to rather than reserved by the states. It's not a state power. It's a congressional power. This was a federalism issue here. And we're going to get into what that means, but I want to make something very clear to those pundits that were saying the Supreme Court is a political institution or it's falling on party lines. This was unanimous as to what the role of the states were here. And the role of the states in this were nothing. The states cannot seek to remove a candidate, disqualify a candidate from public office for President based on the 14th amendment section three, which as we put in our brief, which was really utilized by the court significantly. We're going to go to that in the second half of the broadcast.

I'm going to break you down what we said and where it came up. But this idea that the 14th amendment would be an empowerment to the states when actually the 14th amendment, which was done during reconstruction area was to limit the state. So the court, all nine justices got that part completely right.

Precisely. So states do have power to disqualify, but only with respect to state as opposed to federal offices. And it's clear beyond question that the presidency is a federal office. And so this case raised the question whether the states, in addition to Congress could enforce section three, the Supreme court answered that question unanimously.

The answer is no, it's up to Congress. It's interesting, Cece that, and I'm going to go to Justice Barrett. She wrote a concurring opinion as well. And a concurring opinion means the same result, some different rationale, but she made a statement here that I think is very important for people to understand.

And this is going to this politicalization issue. All nine justices agree on the outcome of this case. This is the message Americans should take home.

Let me read that again. All nine justices agree on the outcome of this case. That is the message that Americans should take home.

Yeah, it's very encouraging. I think we were encouraged even when we heard the oral arguments that all the justices seemed very focused on the language of the 14th amendment. And even in the opinion, it says, you know, the 14th amendment on its face does not give this power to the states.

And so they very much followed the constitution and we saw that from the left and the right. So I know a lot of people are saying this is political, but I think it's the exact opposite. This is not a political opinion. This is an opinion that actually follows the constitution. If you have questions on this and like how this is going to impact the voting, the super Tuesday is tomorrow, what all of this means when you get, you know, a 9-0 opinion like this, and then you get these concurrences that maybe didn't have to go as far as they did, but you know what, this doesn't settle the issue for the future.

We want you to call us. There's no bad questions on this. I mean, these were, again, these are complicated issues. And obviously you saw the timing it took for the Supreme Court to put together what was a very short opinion. I mean, in there, I mean, and I was expecting because they were taking so much time, like hundreds of pages, but it was very tightly worded, very specifically worded. This is one that we, you know, we'll have it through links at aclj.org. I've tweeted out the link as well.

When you have time today, I mean, you could read through it and it's not like those, what I was expecting because of the time delay. Very little on the issue of insurrection. They referenced that that was the allegation made in the complaint in Colorado, but that was it. It was the law, which is exactly what we argued in our brief. In the second half hour of this broadcast, we're going to go through and lay out some of the things we argued in our brief that actually appear in the opinion, including cases that only we were the only group that cited. And we were a party to this on the Colorado GOP. So that's the good news there. We are already getting calls in, but I want to, again, if you want questions on this, and like Jordan said, there is no bad question here.

1-800-684-3110. I really want to explain this to you. Now, this is different than the immunity case, which is currently pending. We're going to, we're working on that brief as well, because there also impacts not getting into becoming President, but operating as President. And these are huge ramifications for our country. Now we've gotten over the hurdle of actually becoming President if, you know, being on the ballot.

Now you can be sued, criminally indicted for decisions you make that are your official acts as President. That's the next challenge. Yep.

All right. I want to go to the phones at 1-800-684-3110. John in Boston on line one. Hey, John.

Hi, good afternoon. Thank you for taking my call. I was just wanting to ask the obvious question, how this affects the judge's decision in Illinois to deny Trump on the ballot there. President Trump will be on the ballot.

Let me play this. This is from Eli Hounding on CNN this morning. So John, you will have him on the ballot by 38.

Your vote will be counted. The bottom line here though, is this is unanimous. It's not up to the states.

And another really important point. This is it nationwide. All the 14th amendment challenges, Maine, Illinois, the dozens of others that had, had failed or were still pending. It's over. The 14th amendment will not be applied to Donald Trump.

He will be on the ballot in every state where he wins the primary. So now the question is that we've got these other cases that, that call was talking about. We have to go back in on those, file motions to dismiss.

You hope these judges don't come up with some creative attempt to try to keep jurisdiction. I don't think that's likely here, but let's talk about the big takeaway here. And I want to get everybody's view on this.

I'll start first with, with Andy. What's the big takeaway? What do you see as the big takeaway here? The unanimity of the court.

That, that impresses me. I'm looking at the concurring opinion of justices Sotomayor, Kagan and Jackson, the three liberal members of the court. And here's what she said. Sotomayor in writing said, allowing Colorado to make the decision as to what, who to keep on the ballot for the Presidential election would create a chaotic state by state patchwork at odds with our nation's federalism principles. That is enough to resolve this case. And the chaos CC is something we pointed out to in our briefing, both at the petition stage and at the merit stage.

Yeah, absolutely. And again, I'll, I'll go to the oral argument because I think that was so telling of this opinion that they focus, the justices focused and even the liberal justices focused on the chaos, as Andy just pointed out that you get, you know, a single candidate would be declared ineligible in some states, but not others. And that just would cause complete chaos and actually nullify the votes of millions of people.

It could have that effect. Harry, and the fact that it is unanimous, what's your takeaway on that part? Well, I think to go back to Andy's point, number one, it removes chaos.

Number two, it removes basically instability within the system. It's important to keep in mind that individuals in Texas and West Virginia have proposed either legislation or judicial action to remove President Biden from the ballot on the other side. So what the Supreme court has done here is that essentially they've eliminated the 14th amendment as an avenue for removing any candidate from the presidency. That is a step forward with respect to democracy. The Supreme court opinion defends democracy. I want to hold up for our ACLJ members, ACLJ members, ACLJ champions, people that support the work of the ACLJ in my hand for our radio audiences. It is six inches thick. This is the paperwork.

And it's actually three times this because this last volume, which is about an inch thick, there are four of, I just can't hold them all. This is what we filed in this case to get this victory. This is the amount of legal work that went in.

So we want to encourage you to do something. This is, as we said, a resounding victory for the ACLJ at the Supreme court, unanimously ruling in our favor, keeping the former President on the ballot. It's one of the biggest Supreme court victories, frankly, we've ever had, certainly the biggest on election integrity. We represented the Colorado GOP in the case. Of course, we had cases all over the country. We protected your right to vote for the candidate of your choice. The only way we get these victories though is with your support, but the legal work does not end. We've got that immunity issue we're fighting now. So once you're in President, can you then be criminally prosecuted for the official acts you take?

The answer has to be no. So we're fighting that. We've got to get dismissed the remaining three cases, which we will.

And then again, as I said, the immunity case, we must defend the constitution once again, though, to make sure the President has the full authority to act without having a battery of lawyers for every decision they make. Go to ACLJ.org and have your tax deductible gift doubled during our life and Liberty drive. If you can make that a monthly gift, by the way, you become an ACLJ champion. And folks again, we need you at the tip of the spear on these issues at ACLJ.org to become a champion again. It's you're standing with us in all of these battles to protect your right to vote and to be involved. ACLJ.org. Welcome back to Sekulow again at 9-0 victory for our client, a party of this case at the US Supreme Court, the Colorado Republican Party, and their chairman, Dave Williams, who's been working alongside our team throughout the beginning and has done a great job again, assisting our team throughout this and taking those phone calls throughout the process, all three levels of the Colorado state court system, and then ultimately to the US Supreme Court.

Dave, thanks for joining us today. Just first, your reaction to this kind of unanimous decision at a time when you don't see a lot of unanimous decisions when cases involve either Donald Trump or politics. You know, I think this is great for the country. The fact that all nine justices, regardless of who appointed them, came to the same conclusion really speaks to how we as a society should not be interfering with the people's right to vote for the candidate of their choice. And that's reflected in the decision.

I couldn't be happier for your work and the work of the team to make this a reality. Dave, you know, you got, obviously it was your state that was the one front and center on this, and it was your party that was the one harmed. And I think what people need to understand in our representation of you before the Supreme Court, and even before the trial court and the Colorado Supreme Court, it was your party position of who the nominees would be on the ballot, and that your secretary of state was basically telling you as the party, you can't do it. You can't put on the person you wanted on that ballot. Or this time it was Trump, next time it would be somebody else.

Right. I've said this from the beginning, I even expressed this to you and the team, that while we certainly agree that Donald Trump had a right to access this ballot, that this case was bigger than Donald Trump's interests. This had to do with the party's ability to nominate the candidate they thought best to represent them on the general election ballot.

If they can do it to someone like Donald Trump, then they could certainly do it to other candidates in the future. And that was something that we wanted to avoid, and thank God that this ruling did just that. I mean, Dave, it kind of came like at the last minute, because you've got a lot of Super Tuesday voting going on in the state where we live in, where you are. I mean, that people, again, I think they were going to come out, a lot of people early voted too, and in most states, it was state anyways if you did early voting. The state that didn't do that, that will be overridden now because it won't matter. But again, I think it will give people a sign too that now they know 100%, it's worth waiting in line, their vote's going to be counted if they decide to vote for Donald Trump, and his name is going to be there on the ballot. It's not going to be tossed aside.

Right. I mean, that was a concern all along. Our secretary of state who sided with the petitioners and was helping them in their case was more than willing not to count those votes. And there was a bit of a question on what exactly would happen if the Supreme Court didn't come back with a ruling that was favorable.

Now that's all avoided. Everyone can vote for Donald Trump and support the presumptive nominee, and it's on to November. So I'm just happy that people have clarity on this. And more importantly, all the other challenges across the nation should be put to an end with this ruling.

And that's just good for our democracy. No, the case affects the entire nation. So there's three other cases we're actively involved in right now. We'll be filing motions to dismiss and get those resolved.

But I want to follow up, Dave, on what you said. This is from the opinion. The result could well be that a single candidate would be declared ineligible in some states but not others based on the same conduct and perhaps even the same factual record. So what all nine justices said was this was going to result in this chaotic approach. And you were seeing that chaos even in Colorado as it started.

Yeah. This was a concern that we all discussed from the very beginning, even when we intervened immediately at the district level, that if this is allowed to stand and it gets this far, you're going to see other states removing Donald Trump. And then if it is allowed to stand, then you're going to see the opposite party, my party, potentially look at removing Joe Biden from the ballot, which just isn't good policy. The people should be deciding these elections, not justices or judges in a courtroom. Actually, Justice, it's interesting you said that because, Dave, the Justice Sotomayor in her concurrence said this, let me read it because it's exactly what you just said. Allowing Colorado to do so would we agree create a chaotic state by state paperwork at odds with our nation's federalism principle? That is enough to resolve the case.

And she goes on to say that by allowing this, you would have basically taken away the right to vote. So again, let me just say a huge thank you for all of us and for the American people, for the Colorado GOP and for you for standing up right in the beginning of this when this thing started. We were the first petition filed with the Supreme Court of the United States to get this stopped because of your organization's involvement. Dave, thanks for being with us and thanks for your hard work on this. Well, thank you.

Happy to have done it with you. Thanks, Dave. And again, let's go right to the phones. 1-800-684-3110. Let's go to Ann in Omaha, Nebraska on Line 1. Ann, welcome to Sekulow. You're on the air.

Hi, thank you very much for taking my call. So my question is, I read an article that was published in The Atlantic, but I'm reading it on Fox, that says the Democrats are or could vote against certifying Trump if he's elected based on whether or not the Supreme Court was clear about whether he was eligible, that's the word, eligible to run for office, that they could decertify him if he was elected. Yeah, so the answer to that is no. I mean, I did see, by the way, some tweets to that effect too. Look, they're going to try to do anything they can to circumvent this. So that's why we got to be very vigilant here, folks. Anytime you win a Supreme Court case, thank you. Thank God.

Thank you, our supporters. But you've got to be vigilant because they're going to try stuff. Now, decertification would be a very dangerous move. You talk about election interference. They've indicted people for questioning the 2020 election.

And now, in this situation, to decertify or not certify the candidate, Harry, would be unprecedented, really. It would be, but I wouldn't put it past the Democrats to attempt to do so, because the Democratic leadership is remarkably inconsistent with respect to legal principles. So they claim to support democracy. They claim that they are defending democracy by going after Donald Trump. But they are nonetheless willing to use the same tactics that they accuse the Republicans of if it achieves a particular political objective.

So I think at the end of the day, we should be wary and we should be prepared that the Democrats who suffer from the Trump derangement syndrome will use any means possible to go after Donald Trump. But let me quote Justice Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson. They wrote a concurring opinion. They agree with the result. They wrote a concurring opinion.

To allow Colorado to take a Presidential candidate off the ballot under Section 3 would imperil the framers' vision of a federal government directly responsible to the people. That's what they said. So to the answer to that question is no, Congress can't do this. This is, folks, but we've got to fight because they're already putting their plan in place, Jordan. That's why we got to really fight here.

That's right. But you hear all these different ways they're looking at it. I mean, there's other court cases going on. Like you said, the immunity case that we're working on right now, filing that brief again, which is, again, very difficult cases at the US Supreme Court. I mean, time and time again, we are seeing this in this term at the US Supreme Court, and we're right in the middle of our life in Liberty Drive in a resounding victory today at the US Supreme Court with this unanimous ruling in our favor stopping what was the left's attempt, as well as Republicans in Washington, DC, who are members of the swamp, don't forget that, to ban President Trump from the ballot. This is one of the biggest Supreme Court victories, the ACLJ's victory in history, and we represented, of course, Dave Williams at the Colorado GOP, in this case, winning a massive victory for the Constitution. But the legal work does not end. We've got three remaining cases to get this dismissed at. In addition, a new fight's been launched on the immunity issue. We've got to defend the Constitution. Again, we need your support.

Go to ACLJ.org. Have your tax-deductible gifts doubled during our life in Liberty Drive because, again, this is a wonderful victory. I don't even think we've seen the ramifications yet from the left on the 9-0 victory. They're starting to react in tweet form.

This was big, but there are bigger cases even coming ahead. Support our work, ACLJ.org. Announcer 1 Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow.

Jordan Sekulow Alright, welcome back to Sekulow. As of now, 9-0, the unanimous victory at the U.S. Supreme Court in favor of President Trump. There were two parties to this case, President Trump and the Colorado Republican Party. We represented the ACLJ, the Colorado Republican Party, as well as a host of additional states throughout the country.

I just want to make sure you remember how much work we were doing in this case, Dad. I mean, we were in Michigan, Wyoming. We're still going to be having to... Announcer 2 You were in Oklahoma? Jordan Sekulow Yeah, in West Virginia, Virginia, and let's see, West Virginia and Virginia, and there's one more that we've still got to file in. Wyoming, yeah, we still have to file in. But we were also in additional states. We placed like Oklahoma as well. In some of these states, we represented 14 other states. Announcer 2 Right.

Jordan Sekulow So this was, again, a tremendous amount of resources. What I like about this, and ultimately, it was a good use of resources at the ACLJ, because this opinion, and your opinion of it, Dad, puts this to rest. They can try workarounds, they can try this, but as Justice Barrett said, they all agree the states have no power when it comes to try to enforce the 14th Amendment, Section 3.

Issue over. Announcer 2 Yeah, I mean, it says, because the Constitution makes Congress rather than the states responsible for enforcing Section 3 against federal officeholders and candidates, we reverse. Justice Barrett, in her concurring opinion, says, here's the solace you should take in this, the message to the American people. She said, this is what you should, actually said, this is the reason you should take it home, is that we all agree that this is the power the state does not have.

So, Andy, they could not be clearer. Announcer 2 No, and I'm very, I keep reading the concurring opinions of Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson, because of the unanimity that they showed in this case, even though they concurred only in the judgment. They nonetheless agreed, and what, and I'm reading from what Justice Sotomayor, no conservative, no originalist, no textualist she, who said states cannot use their control over the ballot to undermine the national government. That danger is even greater in the context of a Presidential election. That from a liberal justice. And then Justice Barrett, she says, all nine justices agree on the outcome of this case. That is the message the American people should take away. Announcer 1 Yeah, and you know, you hear commentators say this is a win for Trump, but it's actually a win for our constitutional republic, because we, the voters, and whether you vote Republican or Democrat, we are the winners that we actually get to vote for the candidate of our choice and that a state cannot decide that. And, you know, they, in this opinion, they point out that even historically, when you look at the history, states have never enforced the third section of the 14th Amendment against federal candidates. So it follows the Constitution.

This is a good opinion. Justice Sotomayor You know, folks, we're in our life and liberty drive. We're on day four here. And this was a resounding victory that would not have happened without you. Because as I showed you, and I'm holding it up again, I want you to see this, folks. This is lacking about six inches more of legal work that went in in a one month period. Thousands of pages of documents, printed, sent to the Supreme Court of the United States because of your support of the ACLJ.

It is a huge win. It was the left's attempt to ban a Presidential candidate. This time it was Donald Trump.

Next time it could be somebody else. I think it's fair to say this is one of the biggest Supreme Court victories in the ACLJ history. A law professor that, my alma mater, calculated that we now have 25 cases at the Supreme Court at the ACLJ during our history. We represented the Colorado GOP. You just had Dave Williams on, winning this massive victory. We protected your right to vote for the candidate of your choice.

And the only way that we get these victories is with your support. Now, here's the thing. Our legal work does not end. First, we got to get these other three cases dismissed. We're going to move to dismiss those. But now we've got the legal issue of what happens to a President when they're in office. Can they then be criminally prosecuted for the decisions they make that are part of their official responsibilities? That is now at the Supreme Court of the United States.

Our brief on that one is due this month. So the fight continues. So we must defend the Constitution once again. Your support is critical. Any amount you donate to our Life and Liberty Drive is matched. It's doubled. Your donation is doubled at ACLJ.org slash Life and Liberty.

And if you can become a monthly donor, you become an ACLJ champion. Folks, we're taking your calls. There's no bad questions here because again, this was a complicated case.

It took a few weeks for the Supreme Court to get it out, even though it's a very short opinion. So we want to hear from you with your questions, your thoughts. 1-800-684-3110.

So you can explain this to your friends and family later today. We'll be right back. Take your calls. 1-800-684-3110.

Support the work of ACLJ, ACLJ.org. All right, let's go back to phones. 1-800-684-3110 with Brad in Pennsylvania on Line 1. Hey, Brad, welcome to Sekulow. You're on the air.

Thank you and thanks for all you do. Sure. My question is what if one of the states chooses to ignore the Supreme Court ruling from this morning? They can't. I mean, they cannot. Let me be clear, Andy, they would be in contempt of court. You'd have to bring a motion, but they cannot ignore the Supreme Court.

No, of course not. I mean, they would be defying the government. In a sense, they would be insurrectionists in their own sense, if I may use that term. But that's what they would be doing. They would be defying an act of a sovereign, rather a co-equal branch of government, the judiciary, and it's not done and that won't happen. It's totally binding. I mean, that would be, like Andy said, that's real insurrection.

If they started to say, yeah, we're ignoring the US Supreme Court, we're not going to give the votes, we're not giving, you know, he's not going to acknowledge it. That's real. That is real.

Let me tell you something else that's real. What you write when it ends up in an opinion. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

So let me start. In the Supreme Court opinion on page six, the opinion reads, after ratification of the 14th Amendment, states use this authority to disqualify state officers in accordance with state statutes. The other side had argued that the, this is what's fascinating, that states had utilized this disqualification power. But as we pointed out in our brief, that was only for states with state officers. We cited the case of Worthy versus Barrett and Sandlin versus Watkins. So that was what the Supreme Court opinion said. Here's what our brief said, citing Worthy. This statute by its term incorporates provision of Section 3 as a standard for a state qualification statute. No comparable Colorado law exists, but if it did, it would apply only to state officers, not the presidency of the United States. North Carolina was not purporting to decide federal election disqualification with a state statute. So that is what we said. And the exact cases were exactly quoted in the exact framework right there.

Let me go to the second one. States have no power under the Constitution to enforce Section 3 with respect to federal offices, especially the presidency. That is on page six of the opinion. And that's a big statement for a couple of reasons. It says states have no power under the Constitution.

So how much clearer could you be? Here's what we wrote. In our brief on page 13, Congress, and only Congress has the authority to enforce Section 3, states cannot claim for themselves authority to seek disqualification of Presidential candidates absent congressional authorization. Harry, there's what the court said, states have no power under the Constitution to enforce Section 3. We said Congress, and only Congress has the authority. That's where the briefs become so critical to these decisions.

Absolutely. So I think it's very, very clear that the ACLJ provided a roadmap for the United States Supreme Court and indeed cited cases that we cited in our brief. So I think it's crystal clear and incredibly important for the audience to understand the work that the ACLJ has done on these particular cases. And I think one of the things that is very, very important for the ACLJ is that we continue to provide a roadmap for Supreme Court decision-making going forward. And the roadmap always includes an exit ramp. And the exit ramp here was we spent a lot of time on a case called the Griffin case and this idea that it wasn't self-executing.

The 14th Amendment, you'd have to get congressional legislation, which is ultimately what they held. I'm holding up again the amount of paper that we filed and the references we're giving you probably equal three pages out of a thousand. But that's what's so critical about that is giving a roadmap, but also an exit ramp for the court. And as you always say, look, I don't care what the opinion says, but what I want to hear is it's reversed. And if you see, if you read the last statement of the opinion, the judgment of the Colorado Supreme Court is reversed.

And like you said, we did provide many off-ramps and, you know, a map of how they get to that point. You know, I make the joke, and it's not a joke, is when you've lost the case below, which we did. I mean, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled against us. You want it to say, as Cece just said, somewhere in the opinion it says reversed. And it says in the last, very last sentence of the opinion, as she said, the judgment of the Colorado Supreme Court is reversed and the mandate shall issue forthwith. So let's talk about what the mandate is here.

The mandate is the actual order from the Supreme Court of the United States to the Colorado Supreme Court saying essentially in plain English, this is our decision, now do what we say. And that's what that, that effectuates it. Yeah. I mean, I think again, as we work through this, that's why we're taking your calls, your questions, 1-800-684-3110. I think it's because there's so much distrust out there for, you know, how will the left look at this to try to find some holes, but just start looking at how they're responding. They're not very happy about this. I mean, let me, to put it lightly, and I think that anger, I mean, you have Keith Olmermann, who's of course on the far left side of the MSNBC side, MSNBC side of the left, he said, the Supreme Court has betrayed democracy, its members, including, and he goes after the three liberals, Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor, have proved themselves inept at reading comprehension. And collectively, the court has shown itself to be corrupt and illegitimate. It must be dissolved.

I mean, that is absurd. And this one from their secretary of state in Colorado, Jenna Griswold, I'm disappointed in the U.S. Supreme Court's decision, stripping states of the authority to enforce Section 3 of the 14th Amendment for federal candidates. Colorado should be able to bar oath-breaking instructions from our ballot. What the Supreme Court said is she never, they didn't strip any power from her state. That state and her office never did have any of that power to do that for federal candidates. For state candidates, under their state law, she might have that power, but she never had that power to do this to federal candidates.

In fact, she knew that, which is why she wanted a court to decide the matter. Well, let me go to the next thing we wrote in our brief, and this we'll put it up on the screen. It says, it is Congress that has long given effect to Section 3 with respect to would-be or existing federal officeholders, shortly after ratifying the amendment Congress enacted, what they called the Enforcement Act of 1870.

That's in the opinion. Then in our brief, look at this, shortly after Griffin's case was decided, Congress enacted the Enforcement Act of 1870, directed specifically at Section 3. And then it says Enforcement Act of 1870, our merits brief at page 21. So that's why the briefing is so critical in these cases. The oral argument's the fun part, but the briefing is where you win and lose cases.

And this was a huge win. And the idea that now the left is going after the liberal justice of the court. Here's what they're mad about. When you look at the opinion of Sotomayor, of Kagan, and of Jackson, the newest justice, this is what they don't like. This is the provision.

I want to get everybody's comment on this. To allow Colorado, this is from Justice Sotomayor Kagan and Justice Jackson, to allow Colorado to take a Presidential candidate off the ballot under Section 3 would imperil the framer's vision of a federal government directly responsible to the people. Harry, that is a correct statement of the law. It is a correct statement of policy. And that is what the left cannot handle right now, that that is from Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson.

I think that is absolutely correct. But even beyond that, we should keep in mind that the left has been disappointed in its own strategy, because the left has attempted on several levels to either disqualify or prosecute Trump and thereby prevent him from running from office. Each effort that the left has mounted to go after Trump has resulted in a rise in his popularity. And now, to the extent that this particular case can be seen as a vindication of Trump's candidacy, this will probably lead to a further rise in his popularity, which will mean that the left will probably go insane.

But, you know, they can go insane, they can go whatever they want. But the fact of the matter is, Kagan, Sotomayor, and Jackson were right. To allow Colorado to take the Presidential candidate off the ballot does affect directly the responsibility of the American people to vote for the candidate.

Oh, I'm sorry. I just want to say, just to set this paragraph above that, I had marked it. This coming out of Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson, it would defy logic for section three to give states new powers to determine who may hold the presidency. Of course, the left is going nuts. Their idols are making these statements because they can read the Constitution. Contrary to what Obermann says, if they fail in their inept at reading comprehension, they did exactly what the Constitution says.

We're not going to give the states new powers to do that. Okay. So here's what we're going to do, folks. We'll take your calls in the next segment. 1-800-684-3110. I know this is complicated. We're breaking it down for you.

1-800-684-3110. You saw that our brief resulted exactly in words written in the opinion. Your support of the ACLJ is the reason, Jordan, that has happened. Yeah, that's absolutely right. I mean, well, first of all, we've got experts writing. We know how to write to the US Supreme Court. I mean, I say that directly when you are writing for the nine justices and you know the style of those nine justices and the words that they're looking for, the tone that they're looking for, but also, as you said, providing them options to choose from as well to resolve the case if they want to go further, if they don't want to go too far. But as you said, it's making sure the goal is to get to five. In this case, we got to nine, nine to zero.

We can't do any better than that. And again, now we've got what most people say is an even tougher case up at the US Supreme Court, which is this whole case of when does Presidential immunity kick in or end? And is it official acts or unofficial acts?

And who defines that? And we're writing that brief right now, March 22nd, I think. Yeah, March of the US Supreme Court. And that's going to be, again, another huge case for Jack Smith and these prosecutions. ACLJ.org, have your gift doubled in our Life and Liberty Drive, ACLJ.org, and do it monthly.

You become a champion. All right, welcome back to Secchio. We're going to take your calls right now, 1-800-684-31. Tim, but I do want to thank Rich, who put in a super chat on YouTube. And he said, and appreciate this, Rich, thank you ACLJ for defending my Colorado vote. And Rich, what we want to say is thank you to Coloradans and the Colorado Republican Party for standing up so we could defend your right to vote as a Colorado voter. Rich, we appreciate you sending that message loud and clear because it was really, Colorado was the state where it went through the entire court system. We won some, lost some, got its way to the US Supreme Court.

And because of Colorado and fighting back that way, this has now ultimately been decided nine to zero by the US Supreme Court. So people have got calls in now about some of these decisions that were made. Let's first go to Dimitro in Washington. We got reconnected with, hey, Dimitro. Hello gentlemen, and thank you for taking my call.

I'm in a little bit of a context of what I want to say or get to. So I'm from Ukraine originally, and I've been living here for almost 20 years. We have a lot of refugees coming because of the war. And I talked with people over and over again about what I like about this country. And one of the biggest points was judicial systems, you know? And I argue that it's great. It's better than in Ukraine or Russia.

No, I think I, Dimitro, you break up a little bit. I think I've got to use this as an immigrant from Ukraine and how here the court system is not corrupt. And I think what you saw today, even when things are very heated, and it was the media making it more heated than I think it actually was, dad, because this was really pretty clear from the start that the secretary of state said these courts were acting way outside their authority, which is why both sides of commentary on the right and left thought that Colorado was probably going to lose. They didn't know that they would lose their three liberals on the court.

I think what's upsetting them is not that they lost today, it's that they lost their three liberals. And what some of them said, but let me read you, this is from the opinion. It says section three of the amendment, let's put it up on the screen, please. Section three of the amendment, and that's the 14th amendment, likewise restricts state autonomy, but through different means. It was designed to help ensure an enduring union by making sure that former Confederates were not able to return to power in the aftermath of the civil war. That was found on page four of the opinion. We wrote on page, and this is in our reply brief on page 19, since the 14th amendment was designed precisely to limit the power of rebellious states, it makes no sense at all to empower such states to bar candidates from federal office. It's exactly what we said, Andy, in our brief.

Yes. And one of the heartening things is when you write a brief, as we have written a brief, and the Supreme Court basically quotes you verbatim, or takes you at your word and trusts you enough to know that you have interpreted the law and advocated the law to them in a fashion, that they basically copy what you say. That's a good thing to do. And that's one of the things that we have been able to show that we did consistently in this case. Because we've been doing it since 1986 before the Supreme Court of the United States. Andy and I, our first case, 86-104.

86 stands for the year 1986. That's how long we've been doing it. So let's go ahead and take Jamie's call out of Las Vegas. Hey, Jamie, welcome to Secula. You're on the air. Thank you. I just want to say a huge thank you to each one of you for the work that you have done and you have continued to do. I've been an ACLJ supporter for 18 years and I believe that your work is very, very important and necessary to protect our constitutional rights. So this is a huge victory for all of us. So thank you, thank you, thank you. May God bless you and continue to bless you as you move forward with everything that you need to do to continue to preserve our freedom. Jamie, I really appreciate you saying that. And I also want to say this to our entire ACLJ team, all the lawyers that worked on it.

I'm not going to go through the whole list because I'll leave somebody out and I don't want to do that. But we had 10 lawyers working on this case for a month to get it ready. It was really expedited. But CC, and you know this because you were working on it with the team too. When we talk about the ACLJ team, this was a team effort.

Absolutely. And really that is all of our efforts are team efforts. We have great attorneys that work really well together. And as you have been pointing out, Jay, the arguments that we made in our briefs were basically followed almost verbatim in the Supreme Court opinion and even by the liberal justices. We pointed out the chaos argument and they point that out as well.

So it's our attorneys did an excellent job. I think the chaos issue, Harry, really got to the court. They knew that the wrong decision here would create state-by-state chaos.

I think that's absolutely correct. And it was also already on the table as a possibility. And even though that wasn't really argued that much by the attorneys, the Supreme Court was aware of this. But it's also important to keep in mind that the Democrats have basically staked their claim to power on the notion of chaos. They say, accept our understanding, our interpretation of the Constitution or else. And I think the Supreme Court, both left and right, withstood the arguments of the Democrats.

And that is in part due to the arguments that the ACLJ has made in its briefing. You know, I want to go back to the phones. 1-800-684-3110, the final call of the day.

We've still got more time to talk. Mario in Montana online for listening in on radio. Hey, Mario. Hey, ACLJ. Thank you for the work you do, your team. I'm so proud of being an American. McEwen, American.

Man, 71 years old, retired, 45 years driving a trumpet out. I'm so proud of what I heard today. And I just have a question. The people, the core lower court in Colorado and the state attorney who started the movement to get removed from the ballot, are they going to be indicted? No, they issued an incorrect decision and they shouldn't be indicted in the United States.

You came from a country that was a dictatorship. In the United States, you can have a wrong legal opinion and you don't go to jail for it and you don't get indicted. And frankly, that's the way it should be. But I think to follow up, Mario, on what you said, and you're a very proud day as Americans, and I agree, I want to quote Justice Barrett because I think this is a good way to get ready to end this broadcast. All nine justices agree on the outcome of this case.

Let me say that again. All nine justices agree with the outcome of this case. That is the message Americans should take home. But that does not happen without the support of friends like you supporting the work of the ACLJ. We are just beginning our Life and Liberty drive this month and a resounding victory. We've started with this at the U.S. Supreme Court, unanimously ruling in our favor, stopping the lefts and some rhino attempts to ban President Trump from the ballot. It's one of the biggest Supreme Court victories in the ACLJ's history. We represented, of course, the Colorado GOP and so many others along this way in this case, winning a massive victory for the Constitution. We protected your right to vote for the candidate of your choice in this election and in future elections.

Let me underscore that. And in future elections as well. And the only way that we get these victories is through your support, because we've got to have the resources to do all of the work that leads to these cases that get to the U.S. Supreme Court. But the legal work here is not even done. The fight continues now because we've got three remaining cases that are ongoing on this issue to get them dismissed. So our attorneys don't just say, yeah, we won. That's it. Moving on. Next case, just immunity.

No, no. We're going to go file those states as well. We must defend the Constitution once again, and we need your support to do it, especially with this immunity case coming up where we're working around the clock again. Go to ACLJ.org and have your tax deductible gift doubled during our Life and Liberty Drive. You donate $50 today. Right now, that is like $100 for the ACLJ.

All you're charged is $50. We've got major battles coming up, Dad. We sure do. And folks, this is a big win. I mean, it's a huge win for the country. It's a huge win for the Constitution. But there's another one that we've got to get the briefing in two and a half weeks. Same kind of issues on what's the authority of the President of the United States. These are huge issues. ACLJ.org, Life and Liberty Drive, have your gift doubled. Talk to you tomorrow.