OAN’s Daniel Baldwin
10:50 AM – Friday, December 29, 2023
The headline of every news network Thursday evening and Friday morning will say that former President Donald Trump was disqualified from the Maine state ballot. But that is not entirely accurate. In the final sentence of her 34-page ruling, Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows stayed her own decision temporarily.
“I will suspend the effect of my decision until the Superior Court rules on any appeal,” Bellows wrote.
This self-stay is consistent with the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling as well, which saw the court temporarily suspend its own respective order.
“To maintain the status quo pending any review by the U.S. Supreme Court, we stay our ruling until January 4, 2024 (the day before the Secretary’s deadline to certify the content of the presidential primary ballot),” read the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling. “If review is sought in the Supreme Court before the stay expires on January 4, 2024, then the stay shall remain in place, and the Secretary will continue to be required to include President Trump’s name on the 2024 presidential primary ballot, until the receipt of any order or mandate from the Supreme Court.”
That is exactly what happened. The Colorado GOP filed a petition to the U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday, asking the Court to reassess the 4-3 decision that barred Trump from running on the presidential ballot due to his role in the Jan. 6 riot. As a result, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold announced that the order was stayed. Trump will remain on the Colorado ballot.
So, as of right now, Trump stays on the ballot in both Maine and Colorado, showing that not only were the rulings toothless, but also political in nature.
“This is an unprecedented action here,” Garrett Ventry, former senior advisor to the Senate Judiciary Committee, told One America News. “Donald Trump has not been indicted on inciting an insurrection in any of the four indictments. Frankly, he was even cleared of that charge in the United States Senate when they impeached him in the second impeachment.”
Bellows is not a lawyer, and she was not popularly elected by the voters of Maine. Instead she was elected to the position of Secretary of State by the Maine Legislature. Yet she claimed it was her “responsibility to act” by depriving voters in her state of their right to cast a ballot for Trump.
“This is an unelected bureaucrat essentially picked by an all Democrat controlled legislator, essentially deciding one politician for 1.7 million voters in Maine, and you’re talking about hundreds of thousand Republicans, she’s making that decision for them,” Ventry said. “And she’s not even elected by the people.”
Even members of her own party disagree with her decision.
“I voted to impeach Donald Trump for his role in the January 6th insurrection,” Democrat Maine Representative Jared Golden wrote. “I do not believe he should be re-elected as President of the United States. However, we are a nation of laws, therefore until he is actually found guilty of the crime of insurrection, he should be allowed on the ballot.”
Republican Maine officials also stepped up to the plate to denounce Bellows’ unilateral ruling.
“Maine voters should decide who wins the election – not a Secretary of State chosen by the Legislature,” wrote Republican Maine Senator Susan Collins.
Despite the fact that Trump remains on the ballot in both Colorado and Maine for the time being, unelected state bureaucrats are attempting to remove the power of citizens to elect the next commander in chief. Ventry says this existential threat to American democracy will result in voters backing Trump even more.
“They’re trying to essentially put him in jail and take him off the ballot,” Ventry said. “That is an unprecedented action. And voters do not like that. They see the naked partisanship of it.”
Polling affirms this sentiment. RealClearPolitics polling average shows Trump leading the GOP primary by 51.2% and the general election by 2.3%.
If Trump’s indictments are any indication, this latest brazen disenfranchisement of voters will only lead to even stronger polling numbers for the 45th president.
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