TRANSCRIPT
In more than two hours of arguments at the United States Supreme Court, both conservative and liberal justices raised questions over whether former President Donald Trump can be disqualified from being president again because of his efforts to overturn his loss in the 2020 election.
The Attorney representing Colorado Voters before the Supreme Court, Jason Murray, says there's a need for justices of the highest court to keep Mr Trump off the state's ballot.
"President Donald Trump engaged in insurrection by inciting a violent mob to attack our Capitol and disenfranchise over 80 million people who voted against him. In doing so, President Trump disqualified himself from holding office. That's not something we are doing to him. That's not something any court is doing to him. That is something he did to himself under our Constitution. ... The law is clear that President Trump can hold no office again unless two-thirds of Congress grant him amnesty."
In December, the Colorado Supreme Court declared Donald Trump ineligible for the presidency due to the insurrection clause in the US Constitution.
The court ruled 4-3 that Mr Trump’s involvement in the Capitol riot disqualified him as a candidate.
Mr Trump appealed the decision by the Colorado Supreme Court, and that is what is being considered by the US Supreme Court now.
The Supreme Court is focusing on whether Congress must act before states can apply this provision to prevent former officeholders from holding office again.
These are the arguments between Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court, Ketanji Brown Jackson, and Jonathan Mitchell, the attorney representing Mr Trump.
JACKSON: “The Colorado Supreme Court concluded that the violent attempts of the petitioner supporters in this case to halt the count, on January 6th qualified as an insurrection, as defined by section three. And I read your opening brief to accept that those events counted as an insurrection. But then your reply seemed to suggest that they were not. So what is your position, then?”
MITCHELL: "We never accepted or conceded in our opening brief that this was an insurrection. What we said in our opening brief was President Trump did not engage in any act that can plausibly be characterised as insurrection.”
JACKSON: "And what is your argument that it's not, your reply brief says that it wasn't because I think you say, it did not involve an organised attempt to overthrow the government."
MITCHELL: “That's one of many reasons. But for an insurrection, there needs to be an organised, concerted effort to overthrow the government of the United States through violence."
JACKSON: “And this sort of point is that a chaotic effort to overthrow the government is not an insurrection?”
MITCHELL “We didn't concede that it's an effort to overthrow the government, either. Justice Jackson right. None of these criteria were met. This was a riot. It was not an insurrection. The events were shameful, criminal, violent, all of those things. But it did not qualify as insurrection as that term is used in section three.”
JACKSON: “Thank you.”
Mr Trump says he is pleased with the performance of his legal team.
"I thought the presentation today was a very good one. I think it was well received, I hope it was well received. You have millions of people that are out there wanting to vote and they happen to want to vote for me, or the Republican party, whatever you want, however you want to phrase it."
He also had much praise for the democratic process.
"So I just say that, in watching the Supreme Court today, I thought it was very, it's a very beautiful process. I hope that democracy in this country will continue. Because right now we have a very, very tough situation with all of the radical left ideas, with the weaponisation of politics. They weaponised it like it's never been weaponised before."
But then, contrary to what his lawyer says, Mr Trump goes on to say the 6th of January assault on the Capitol Building, was in fact, an insurrection.
"And the one thing I'll say is they kept saying about what I said right after the insurrection. I think it was an insurrection caused by Nancy Pelosi. This was an insurrection, if it was an insurrection, which there were no guns, there were no anything except for the fact that they shot Ashli Babbitt. Somebody from the police force shot Ashli Babbitt, so unnecessary, so sad, so horrible. But there were no guns. "
This case is one of several criminal prosecutions Donald Trump faces as he seeks to regain the presidency.
He faces federal charges in the state of Florida that he illegally retained classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
In the state of Georgia, he's charged with scheming to subvert that state's 2020 election result, and in New York, he's facing a trial over hush money payments made to porn actor Stormy Daniels.
Mr Trump denies all wrongdoing.
This comes as a U-S special counsel found President Joe Biden knowingly held and revealed classified information related to the Afghanistan war and U-S national security.
The investigation, initiated over a year ago, involved secret documents discovered at President Biden’s home and former office.
The incident occurred during his departure from the vice-presidency in 2017.
Among the files was a handwritten memo to then-President Barack Obama opposing a troop surge in Afghanistan in 2009.
Mr Biden will face no criminal charges.
