Maine’s Secretary of State announced on Thursday that former US President Donald Trump would be removed from the state’s 2024 ballot, CNN reported.
The decision makes Maine the second state to disqualify Trump, after the Colorado Supreme Court handed down a ruling that removed him from the ballot earlier this month.
Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, issued the decision after presiding over an administrative hearing earlier this month about Trump’s eligibility for office, reported CNN.
Bellows’ decision, like the Colorado ruling, was based on the 14th Amendment’s “insurrectionist ban.”
Section 3 of the Civil War-era 14th Amendment says: “No person shall ... hold any office, civil or military, under the United States ... who, having previously taken an oath ... as an officer of the United States, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”
“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.”
Bellows’ decision can be appealed in state court, and Trump’s side is expected to challenge this outcome.
On Wednesday, the Colorado Republican Party announced it has asked the US Supreme Court to overturn the state Supreme Court ruling that removed Trump from Colorado’s 2024 ballot.