Will the Supreme Court Disqualify Donald Trump?
Channel: CNN
Transcript
Language: English (original, Whisper AI)
[0:05] So, voters have already started voting in the Republican presidential primary.
[0:10] We've talked about it on the show a few times.
[0:12] And former President Donald Trump is two for two so far,
[0:16] with dominating wins in Iowa and New Hampshire.
[0:19] As of this moment, he is on track to lock up a third straight nomination.
[0:24] But can he seal the deal if he's not on the ballot in every state?
[0:28] The Colorado Supreme Court, get this, has just ruled on a challenge to Donald Trump's appearance on the state's 2024 ballot.
[0:37] The Colorado Supreme Court ruling just moments ago that former President Trump should be removed.
[0:42] The consequences of this decision are obviously enormous.
[0:49] You might remember, back in December, Colorado's highest court said Trump was ineligible for office
[0:55] under the 14th Amendment's so-called insurrection ban.
[0:58] Now, the court immediately paused the ruling because they knew Trump would appeal it all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court.
[1:05] Well, later this week, the high court will hear the case.
[1:13] My guest this week is CNN's senior Supreme Court analyst, Joan Biskupic.
[1:18] We're going to talk about how both sides plan to lay out their arguments
[1:21] and how the ruling could alter American democracy as we know it.
[1:26] From CNN, this is one thing.
[1:29] I'm David Rind.
[1:34] Joan, I want to start by looking at the actual text of the U.S. Constitution
[1:39] that is at the heart of what the Supreme Court will be scrutinizing this week.
[1:43] Can you just read it for me?
[1:44] Yes.
[1:45] And now let me tell our audience, this is going to be a mouthful,
[1:48] but trust me, all nine justices will be parsing these words during oral arguments
[1:53] as they go through the briefs.
[1:55] So they're important.
[1:57] Section 3 of the 14th Amendment says,
[2:01] No person shall hold any office under the United States
[2:06] who, having previously taken an oath as a member of Congress
[2:11] or as any officer of the United States
[2:15] to support the Constitution of the United States,
[2:19] shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion
[2:22] against the same or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.
[2:30] Now, I do want to mention that I did have a couple of ellipses in there,
[2:34] but you can tell it was already long enough.
[2:36] Yeah, yeah.
[2:36] There's a lot there.
[2:38] I'm not a lawyer.
[2:39] But to me, what that says is that somebody who, you know,
[2:44] engaged in insurrection or rebellion
[2:45] and kind of worked in some kind of office for the United States
[2:50] can't hold office again.
[2:52] Is that the basic gist?
[2:54] Yes, that's the idea.
[2:56] It was intended right after the Civil War,
[2:59] targeting former Confederate leaders
[3:01] to make sure that they did not return to office.
[3:04] So how are both sides going to be arguing this at the Supreme Court?
[3:08] Okay.
[3:08] To boil it down,
[3:10] Trump's legal team is focused on the first part,
[3:14] the part when I referred to, you know,
[3:16] an officer of the United States.
[3:18] Now, the challengers focus on the second part,
[3:21] the insurrectionist part.
[3:23] And let me explain.
[3:24] Former President Donald Trump says that he is not a, quote,
[3:27] officer of the United States,
[3:29] as that term is used in this Section 3 of the 14th Amendment
[3:34] or in other places in the Constitution.
[3:36] Now, regular people out there might be thinking,
[3:39] well, the president is the chief executive officer.
[3:42] Yeah, he was the president.
[3:43] Exactly.
[3:43] How can he not be a, quote,
[3:45] officer of the United States?
[3:47] But the Trump lawyers are taking a very textualist view of it
[3:51] and saying that an officer of the United States,
[3:54] as the term was used in the Constitution,
[3:56] is not covered by it.
[3:57] And they also point to the oaths that the president
[4:01] and other officers of the U.S. take that are different.
[4:05] What Jonathan Mitchell, the lead lawyer for Donald Trump,
[4:09] stresses is the president swears a different oath
[4:13] as set forth in Article 2,
[4:15] in which he promises to preserve, protect,
[4:18] and defend the Constitution of the United States.
[4:20] And nowhere is the specific word support,
[4:23] which is in Section 3 of the 14th Amendment,
[4:26] nowhere is the word support used.
[4:28] Now, you can tell that I'm talking about, you know,
[4:31] these discrete terms that, you know,
[4:34] could make some people's eyes glaze over,
[4:36] but this might be exactly what the justices focus on.
[4:39] And then let me just give the challenger side real quickly.
[4:42] Yeah, what's their argument?
[4:43] Yes, they home in on insurrection.
[4:45] And in their brief that was just submitted recently,
[4:49] they stress right at the outset,
[4:51] the most violent attack on our nation's capital
[4:54] since the War of 1812,
[4:56] an attack which obstructed the peaceful transfer
[4:58] of presidential power for the first time
[5:01] in American history,
[5:02] meets any plausible definition of insurrection
[5:06] against the Constitution.
[5:07] When it comes to Trump's actions or inactions
[5:10] on January 6th,
[5:12] when we're talking about the actual insurrection part of this,
[5:14] how much does that matter here in this specific case?
[5:18] Well, a trial court judge in Colorado
[5:21] found that Donald Trump
[5:22] had actually engaged in an insurrection.
[5:25] Now, you have people on the other side who say,
[5:28] well, you know,
[5:29] anybody who would be in the end deemed an insurrectionist
[5:31] would have had to have been charged in some way with it,
[5:34] or that there would have been much more of a need
[5:37] for a real evidentiary hearing.
[5:39] But I'm just going to cut right through that
[5:42] and say that I'm not sure the Supreme Court's
[5:45] even going to reach that issue.
[5:46] In fact, I'm sure a majority of the justices
[5:49] do not want to even go near the actual insurrectionist issue
[5:52] of what Donald Trump did or didn't do on January 6th.
[5:55] I have a feeling that they will be much more focused
[5:58] on some of the threshold issues of
[6:01] who is an officer of the United States?
[6:04] What kind of oath must you have taken?
[6:06] You know, all these other questions, including,
[6:10] here's a very basic one,
[6:12] should this section of the Constitution
[6:14] be enforced only based on some legislation from Congress
[6:18] rather than automatically be executed
[6:21] through judicial decisions?
[6:31] I realize this theory and this part of this amendment
[6:35] has pretty much been untested in modern times.
[6:38] So what does the wider legal community think about it?
[6:41] Well, you have very smart people on both sides.
[6:44] Donald Trump has the broader legal community
[6:47] that's tied to politics, Republican politics.
[6:50] Now, the challengers have some really good conservative thinkers
[6:54] who, you know, you might have thought,
[6:56] well, wouldn't they be behind Trump?
[6:57] But no, no.
[6:58] One of the most prominent on that side
[7:00] is former U.S. appellate judge Michael Ludig.
[7:03] So both sides have good arguments,
[7:05] but both sides also have tricky arguments.
[7:07] And as you say,
[7:08] this simply hasn't been tested in modern times.
[7:11] And then you have the political overlay
[7:13] that just cannot be ignored.
[7:15] Even many liberal lawyers,
[7:18] liberal commentators,
[7:19] and jurists even,
[7:20] who would never, ever cast a vote for Donald Trump
[7:24] under any circumstances,
[7:26] likely believe that whether he stays on the ballot
[7:28] is not a question for the judiciary,
[7:30] but more a matter to be left to the voters
[7:33] or to the political branches.
[7:35] On a technical level, Joan,
[7:38] this case is just about Colorado, right?
[7:41] But what could ruling mean for the rest of the country
[7:44] as ballots get prepared?
[7:46] You're right that this case came from Colorado,
[7:48] and in a different kind of world,
[7:51] the justices could have just decided it
[7:52] based on some of the procedures in Colorado.
[7:55] But already this case is so much larger
[7:58] because voters in other states
[8:01] have challenged Donald Trump's position on the ballot.
[8:04] We're going to have a ruling from the justices
[8:07] that will affect every single state in America
[8:10] and where Donald Trump appears on primary ballots
[8:13] and what happens for the November election.
[8:15] So it's huge.
[8:17] Yeah, I was going to say,
[8:18] you've covered the court for a long time,
[8:19] so can you give us some perspective,
[8:21] like what is at stake for the court
[8:23] and for the country as we head closer
[8:25] to this election in November?
[8:28] So much is at stake in our democracy.
[8:31] You know, I was actually around in the year 2000
[8:34] for Bush v. Gore,
[8:35] and we thought we would never see anything like that again.
[8:41] And just to remind people what happened then.
[8:44] CNN has just learned
[8:45] that the United States Supreme Court
[8:47] has reached a decision.
[8:49] By a one vote,
[8:50] the justices ruled in favor
[8:52] of former Texas Governor George W. Bush
[8:55] over then-Vice President Al Gore.
[8:58] Let me get to the bottom line here.
[9:00] The judgment of the Supreme Court of Florida
[9:02] is reversed.
[9:03] That was the judgment
[9:04] that had allowed these broad counts to go forward.
[9:07] And, you know,
[9:09] here's an interesting thing about that.
[9:11] When the court ruled,
[9:12] they stopped the recounts down in Florida.
[9:15] They said the crucial electoral votes
[9:18] should go to George Bush.
[9:20] Al Gore just said, okay, okay.
[9:22] Let there be no doubt.
[9:24] While I strongly disagree with the court's decision,
[9:28] I accept it.
[9:30] I accept the finality of this outcome,
[9:33] which will be ratified next Monday
[9:34] in the Electoral College.
[9:36] And tonight,
[9:37] for the sake of our unity as a people
[9:39] and the strength of our democracy,
[9:41] I offer my concession.
[9:43] You know, nobody stormed the Capitol.
[9:45] He just accepted that decision.
[9:47] And that decision, you know,
[9:48] half the country thought that decision was wrong.
[9:50] Half the country thought it was right.
[9:51] I know that many of my supporters
[9:53] are disappointed.
[9:54] I am too.
[9:56] But our disappointment must be overcome
[9:59] by our love of country.
[10:00] Make no mistake,
[10:02] this election was stolen from you,
[10:04] from me,
[10:05] and from the country.
[10:06] And, you know,
[10:07] contrast that to what happened
[10:08] just back in 2020,
[10:10] when we had the seeds of,
[10:12] you know,
[10:13] the terrible violence
[10:14] at the U.S. Capitol
[10:16] that is leading to this action right now.
[10:19] Because you'll never
[10:20] take back our country
[10:22] with weakness.
[10:23] You have to show strength
[10:24] and you have to be strong.
[10:29] Is that something that weighs
[10:30] on the justices then
[10:31] as they make this decision
[10:33] because Trump is involved?
[10:34] Two things about
[10:35] that question there.
[10:36] The justices really don't want
[10:38] these kinds of cases
[10:39] on their doorstep,
[10:40] just basically any kind
[10:41] of election question.
[10:42] But you're exactly right
[10:43] to ask about
[10:44] Donald Trump's involvement.
[10:46] Donald Trump cases
[10:47] are especially fraught
[10:49] for these justices,
[10:50] even for his three appointees,
[10:53] Neil Gorsuch,
[10:54] Brett Kavanaugh,
[10:54] and Amy Coney Barrett.
[10:55] They don't really like
[10:56] to have them up there.
[10:57] They already feel like
[10:58] everyone believes
[10:59] every vote they cast
[11:00] is partisan.
[11:01] So this just complicates
[11:03] things more.
[11:03] And I just want to say,
[11:05] you know,
[11:06] we had talked a little bit
[11:07] about what was going on
[11:08] in the year 2000
[11:09] during Bush v. Gore.
[11:11] You know,
[11:11] back then,
[11:12] we never spoke as we do now
[11:14] about the future
[11:15] of democracy.
[11:16] And that's really
[11:17] what we think.
[11:18] The future of democracy
[11:20] nationwide is at risk.
[11:22] And voters,
[11:23] regular people,
[11:24] may not be able
[11:25] to control the outcome
[11:26] of who becomes
[11:27] the next president
[11:27] and how the justices'
[11:29] rule in this case
[11:30] will be a step toward
[11:32] maybe ensuring confidence
[11:34] in the system
[11:34] or maybe not ensuring
[11:36] confidence in the system.
[11:37] And one last thing
[11:38] I will say is that
[11:39] everyone can listen in
[11:40] on Thursday,
[11:41] February 8th
[11:42] to the arguments
[11:42] because they'll be
[11:43] live streamed
[11:44] from the court.
[11:44] And we love that.
[11:46] Joan, thank you.
[11:48] Thank you.
[11:56] One Thing is a production
[11:57] of CNN Audio.
[11:59] This episode was produced
[12:00] by Paolo Ortiz
[12:01] and me, David Rind.
[12:02] Our senior producer
[12:03] is Fez Jamil.
[12:04] Our supervising producer
[12:05] is Greg Peppers.
[12:07] Matt Dempsey
[12:07] is our production manager.
[12:09] Dan DeZula
[12:09] is our technical director.
[12:11] And Steve Liktai
[12:12] is the executive producer
[12:13] of CNN Audio.
[12:14] We get support
[12:15] from Haley Thomas,
[12:16] Alex Manassari,
[12:18] Robert Mathers,
[12:19] John Deionora,
[12:20] Lenny Steinhardt,
[12:21] Jameis Andres,
[12:22] Nicole Passeroux,
[12:23] and Lisa Namarow.
[12:24] Special thanks
[12:25] to Katie Hinman.
[12:26] And one more thing,
[12:27] if you're enjoying the show,
[12:28] let us know.
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[12:34] We'll be back next week.
[12:36] Talk to you then.
[12:42] We'll be back next week.