Supreme Court is poised to rule on Monday on Trump’s fitness to hold office
The Supreme Court announced Sunday that it would issue at least one decision on Monday, a strong signal that it would then decide former President Donald J. Trump’s eligibility for the Colorado primary ballot.
The announcement stated that Monday’s opinion or opinions would be posted online beginning at 10 a.m. “The court will not sit in court,” it said.
The court’s usual practice, although suspended during the pandemic, is to announce decisions in contested cases from the bench. The judges were not scheduled to return to the courtroom until March 15.
The timing of the court’s actions may have been influenced by the election calendar. In urging the justices to intervene in the case, the Republican Party of Colorado had asked them to act before this week’s looming Super Tuesday primaries, which include Colorado.
The ruling will likely determine not only whether Mr. Trump can appear on the Colorado primary ballot, but also whether he is eligible to participate in the general election. The decision will almost certainly apply to every other state where Trump’s eligibility to run for office is challenged.
Not Since Bush vs. Gorethe 2000 decision that handed the presidency to George W. Bush is what allowed the Supreme Court to play such a direct role in a presidential contest.
The Colorado Supreme Court December reigned that Mr. Trump is ineligible to hold or hold office under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which was passed after the Civil War and bans people who have sworn to support the Constitution and then rebelled have resigned, to hold an office.
After Mr. Trump asked the U.S. Supreme Court On January 3 to hear his appeal, the judges moved with considerable speed to resolve the issue. They granted a review just two days after filing and scheduled arguments for about a month later.
Based on questions during the oral argument, Mr. Trump is likely to prevail.
The court is also considering a second case involving Mr. Trump, over whether he is immune from prosecution over allegations that he planned to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election. That has been slower than the Colorado case.
The justices took 16 days after Trump’s emergency immunity request to schedule oral arguments seven weeks later, the week of April 22. The court kept the trial, once scheduled for March 4, on hold in the meantime.
If the court rules in the Colorado case on Monday, it will have taken action within a month of the hearing. If it follows this pace in the immunity case, a decision could come by the end of May. And if Mr. Trump loses, the preliminary proceedings would resume and the trial itself could begin in late September, barring other hurdles.