MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — State Attorney General Patrick Morrisey has joined the state of Indiana and others to challenge the Colorado Supreme Court ruling to remove former President Donald Trump from the May primary ballot.
The successful legal battle against 2024 Republican candidate for president from Texas John Castro’s effort to remove Trump from West Virginia resulted in the state joining the suit with Indiana, Morrisey said on WAJR’s “Talk of the Town.”
“We spent a lot of time on the West Virginia-specific challenge, and by doing so, we developed expertise that was very beneficial to adding that perspective to this case,” Morrisey said.
The heart of the Colorado case comes from Anderson v. Trump, which cites Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. The post-Civil War era law bars anyone from holding office who participated in an insurrection.
“We believe that when it comes to defining the clause of insurrection, that’s really the role of Congress as opposed to the states because that is a uniquely national office,” Morrisey said.
Morrisey said it’s very important to be a part of this to prevent select states from influencing the choices available on a national ballot.
“Every state looks and ultimately is impacted by that,” Morrisey said. “Our states’ votes get diluted when other states can just arbitrarily make their decisions on the basis of this national election.”
Allowing the states to make national ballot decisions regularly could lead to chaos in the future, making it very important to prevent the actions of other states from diluting the choices of voters here.
“Even if he’s on the ballot in West Virginia and gets knocked out in all the other places, that definitively impacts West Virginia, and I’ve had a lot of people that are very happy we’re out front leading this issue with Indiana,” Morrisey said.