Maine’s top election official on Thursday removed former President Donald Trump from the state’s Republican primary ballot under the 14th Amendment’s “insurrectionist ban.”
Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, issued the decision after presiding over an administrative hearing earlier this month on Trump’s eligibility after a bipartisan group of former state lawmakers challenged his candidacy, according to CNN. Bellows halted her decision pending an appeal to a state court, which Trump’s team vowed to file.
“I do not reach this conclusion lightly,” Bellows wrote. “Democracy is sacred … 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. I am also mindful, however, that no presidential candidate has ever before engaged in insurrection.”
Maine is the second state to remove Trump from the primary ballot after the Colorado Supreme Court ruled earlier this month that Trump was ineligible to appear on the ballot. That ruling has similarly been stayed pending an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. Similar efforts have failed in other states and most legal experts believe the U.S. Supreme Court will settle the issue for the entire country.
Bellows wrote that she has a legal obligation to comply with the 14th Amendment and remove Trump.
“The oath I swore to uphold the Constitution comes first above all, and my duty under Maine’s election laws … is to ensure that candidates who appear on the primary ballot are qualified for the office they seek,” she said.
Bellows noted that evidence showed that the Jan. 6 Capitol attack “occurred at the behest of” Trump – and that the US Constitution “does not tolerate an assault on the foundations of our government.”
“The record establishes that Mr. 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,” Bellows wrote. “I likewise conclude that Mr. 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.”
Trump has yet to comment on the removal but took to Truth Social Thursday night to direct his followers to Bellows’ official website.
Trump’s campaign accused Bellows of being a “virulent leftist” who has now “decided to interfere in the presidential election.”
“We are witnessing, in real-time, the attempted theft of an election and the disenfranchisement of the American voter,” said Steven Cheung, a campaign spokesman for Trump, who has repeatedly sought to throw out votes in areas he lost and argued that former President Barack Obama was ineligible to be president over a false claim that he was born in Kenya.
The pro-Trump MAGA War Room posted a photo of Bellows posing with President Joe Biden, questioning whether followers believed she is “impartial.”
“I stand with President Trump against the Left’s blatant attack on our democracy,” tweeted Trump ally Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn.
“The Maine Secretary of State’s decision to remove Trump from the ballot is reckless and partisan. I am confident the Supreme Court will reverse it,” wrote House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La.
Some Trump opponents also criticized the decision. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie warned that the move will make Trump a “martyr.”
“This should be decided by the voters of the United States. It should not be decided by courts. And the fact is, while there may be — people may think there’s a justification for doing this — it’s not good in our democracy,” he told CNN. “In the end, Donald Trump should be defeated by the voters at the polls and defeated by someone like me, who is willing to tell the truth about…
Read More: MAGA meltdown as Trump sics Truth Social fans on Maine secretary of state who booted him off ballot