California Secretary of State Shirley Weber refused to go along with calls from some Democrats in her state to remove former President Donald Trump from the 2024 primary ballot.
Last week, Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis called for Weber to strike Trump from the ballot following the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision to bar the former president from the ballot, claiming the insurrection clause of the 14th Amendment disqualifies him from holding office. Weber responded to the lieutenant governor’s request without clarifying whether she would follow through and remove Trump’s name from the pool of candidates, but on Thursday night, the secretary of state’s office released the list of certified candidates, showing Trump on the ballot, CBS Los Angeles reported.
While Weber didn’t comment on her refusal to go along with some Democrats’ calls for Trump’s removal, she wrote in a letter to Kounalakis last week that “Removing a candidate from the ballot under Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment is not something my office takes lightly and is not as simple as the requirement that a person be at least 35 years old to be president.”
Multiple top California Democrats joined Kounalakis’ request for Trump’s removal from the ballot, but Governor Gavin Newsom — who has been floated as a potential future Democratic presidential candidate — slammed the idea of kicking Trump off the primary ballot.
“There is no doubt that Donald Trump is a threat to our liberties and even to our democracy,” Newsom said. “But in California, we defeat candidates at the polls. Everything else is a political distraction.”
Trump, the Republican frontrunner, is back on the ballot in Colorado for the time being after the state’s Republican Party appealed the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. Trump will remain on the state’s ballot “unless the Supreme Court declines to take the case or otherwise affirms the Colorado Supreme Court ruling,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold’s office said on Thursday.
Just hours after the former president was put back on Colorado’s ballot, however, another blue state removed him from its ballot. Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows said Thursday that Trump is disqualified from the state’s primary ballot, arguing that he violated the 14th Amendment’s insurrection clause due to his conduct leading up to the U.S. Capitol breach on January 6, 2021.
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Trump’s team blasted Maine’s move to remove the Republican Party’s leading candidate from the ballot and vowed to take legal action.
“We will quickly file a legal objection in state court to prevent this atrocious decision in Maine from taking effect, and President Trump will never stop fighting to Make America Great Again,” Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement.
Trump is currently leading Republican candidates in national primary polls by over 50 points and is polling ahead of President Joe Biden by around two points, according to the latest Real Clear Politics average. The 2024 primary season kicks off with the Iowa caucuses on January 15 and the New Hampshire primary on January 23.