Lawsuit filed to block Trump from appearing on Colorado’s 2024 ballot

A lawsuit filed by a watchdog group aims to block former President Donald Trump from appearing on Colorado’s 2024 ballot because of his ties to the deadly Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. 

The suit was filed by the Washington, D.C.-based Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, a nonprofit, on behalf of a group of Republican and unaffiliated voters, including a former state lawmaker. Martha Tierney, one of the lead attorneys in the case, however, represents the Colorado Democratic Party in campaign matters. 

“As a longtime Republican who voted for him, I believe Donald Trump disqualified himself from running in 2024 by spreading lies, vilifying election workers and fomenting an attack on the Capitol,” Krista Kafer, a Republican activist and political commentator in Colorado who is one of the plaintiffs, said in a written statement. “Those who by force and by falsehood subvert democracy are unfit to participate in it.”

The lawsuit was filed against Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat. It argues that Trump’s ties to the Jan. 6 riot disqualify him from running for president under the 14th Amendment, which bars people who took an “oath … to support the Constitution of the United States” and then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof” from holding federal or state office.

Griswold, in a statement reacting to the lawsuit, didn’t take a position on the legal action.

“I look forward to the Colorado court’s substantive resolution of the issues, and am hopeful that this case will provide guidance to election officials on Trump’s eligibility as a candidate for office,” she said.

The lawsuit is part of a national effort by Trump’s opponents to disqualify him from running again in 2024. Trump has been federally indicted for his alleged role in the Jan. 6 riot, as well as in Georgia, where prosecutors allege he and his allies tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election. 

A federal judge dismissed a similar lawsuit in Florida last week, finding that the plaintiffs lacked standing.

A report issued this week by the Project on Government Oversight found that candidates have been excluded from the ballot in all 50 states in the past. 

In terms of electoral consequences, it wouldn’t matter much for Trump if he was barred from the Colorado ballot. He lost the state in 2016 and 2020. It’s highly unlikely he would win in 2024 in Colorado, where Republicans have no statewide elected officials and are in a historic minority at the state Capitol. 

Trump has said that efforts to block him from appearing on the ballot amount to “election interference.”

Other plaintiffs in the lawsuit include: 

Norma Anderson, a Republican who was formerly the majority leader in the Colorado Senate  Michelle Priola, the wife of state Sen. Kevin Priola, who switched his part affiliation to Democratic from Republican in 2022 Chris Castilian, chief of staff for then-Gov. Bill Owens, a Republican. Castilian is also a former executive director of Great Outdoors Colorado.

Mario Nicolais, a Colorado Sun columnist, is another one of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs in the case.

This is a developing story that will be updated.