2024 US President Elections: After Colorado, Donald Trump disqualified from Maine’s primary ballot

Maine’s top election official on Thursday disqualified Donald Trump from the state ballot in next year’s US presidential primary election, according to Reuters reports. With this, it has become the second state to bar the former president for his role in the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol.

Shenna Bellows, Maine Secretary of State who is a Democrat concluded that the frontrunner for the Republican nomination in 2024 incited an insurrection when he spread false claims about voter fraud in the 2020 election and then urged his supporters to march on the Capitol to stop lawmakers from certifying the vote.

She suspended her decision until the state supreme court ruled on the matter, as per Reuters reports. 

The decision followed claims made by a group of former Maine lawmakers that Trump ought to be disqualified under a US Constitution clause that prohibits individuals from holding public office if they have previously sworn allegiance to the country and engaged in "insurrection or rebellion."

The ruling applies to the March primary election but it could affect Trump's status for the November general election. It likely will add to pressure on the US Supreme Court to resolve questions about Trump’s eligibility nationwide, Reuters reported. 

Trump has not been charged with insurrection in connection with the attack on January 6, despite being indicted in a federal case and a Georgian one for his role in attempting to rig the 2020 election. In the contest for the Republican nomination in 2024, he is far ahead of the pack according to opinion polls.

Besides Maine, Colorado’s top court also disqualified Trump from the state primary ballot on December 19, making him the first candidate in US history to be deemed ineligible for the presidency for engaging in insurrection.

Trump has vowed to appeal the Colorado ruling to the Supreme Court and criticized ballot challenges as “undemocratic.” The Colorado Republican Party filed its own Supreme Court appeal on Wednesday.

Similar attempts to disqualify Trump in other states have been rejected. The top court in Michigan, a pivotal battleground state in the general election, declined on Wednesday to hear an appeal on Trump's eligibility to hold office.

(With Reuters inputs)