'Remove him from the ballot': Conservative urges SCOTUS to disqualify Trump for 'sedition'

Prominent conservative writer David French is calling on the Supreme Court of the United States to uphold the Colorado supreme court's disqualification of former President Donald Trump from the 2024 ballot.

In a Thursday op-ed for the New York Times titled "The Case for Disqualifying Trump Is Strong," French lauded the 4-3 decision in the Anderson v. Griswold case that ultimately struck Trump from the GOP primary ballot in the Centennial State. French delved into Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution (also known as the "insurrection clause") and opined that applying the "plain language" of the clause to the former president's 2024 candidacy should disqualify him given his role in the January 6, 2021 riot at the US Capitol.

"It’s time to apply the plain language of the Constitution to Trump’s actions and remove him from the ballot — without fear of the consequences," French wrote. "Republics are not maintained by cowardice."

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"What do you call the effort to overthrow a lawfully elected government through a combination of violence and legal subterfuge? In its ruling, the Colorado Supreme Court reviewed a variety of colloquial and legal definitions of insurrection and reached a common-sense conclusion 'that any definition of ‘insurrection' for purposes of Section 3 would encompass a concerted and public use of force or threat of force by a group of people to hinder or prevent the U.S. government from taking the actions necessary to accomplish a peaceful transfer of power in this country," he continued.

"I have respect for those who argue that Jan. 6 was merely a riot and not a true 'insurrection or rebellion,' but the clear and undisputed aims of the Trump scheme are what elevate his misconduct to rebellious status," he added. "The effort to steal the election wasn’t a mere protest. It represented an effort to change the government of the United States."

French isn't alone in his belief that even a 6-3 conservative Supreme Court majority would be justified in disqualifying the former president despite justices' ideological leanings. In a December essay for The Atlantic, University of Baltimore School of Law professor Kimberly Wehle wrote that philosophically, it would make sense for the Court to uphold Anderson v. Griswold given that the Colorado supreme court majority ruling was rooted in principles of "judicial conservatism" like textualism and originalism. And like Wehle, French argued that the constitutional argument in favor of disqualifying Trump is "the essence of origialism."

"Remember, when reading the Constitution, words still retain their ordinary meaning... One should not read constitutional provisions in a way that reaches facially absurd results," he wrote. "So no, it would not be a stretch for a conservative Supreme Court to apply Section 3 to Trump... The wisdom of the old Republican Party should now save us from the fecklessness and sedition of the new."

READ MORE: Legal expert: SCOTUS should disqualify Trump given 'judicial conservatism' behind CO ruling

Click here to read French's op-ed in full.