Should Trump Be Barred From the Ballot?

The Ezra Klein Show

New York Times Opinion

Society & Culture, Government, News

4.6 • 11K Ratings

🗓️ 12 January 2024

⏱️ 62 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

There’s this incredible dissonance at the center of our politics right now. On the one hand, all the polling suggests that Donald Trump is about to win Iowa Republican caucuses and the New Hampshire primary. He seems overwhelmingly likely to be his party’s nominee, and so possibly our next president. On the other hand, he could be constitutionally disqualified from taking office. Colorado and Maine concluded as much, and tossed him off their ballots. And now the Supreme Court is poised to take on this unprecedented question of whether a little-known provision of the Constitution, written in the aftermath of the Civil War, can bar Trump from running and scramble the election in 2024. The Times Opinion columnist David French has been on the show before, as both a guest and a guest host, to break down the criminal cases against Trump. This time, I’ve asked David back to make his case for why Trump is constitutionally disqualified. We discuss some of the biggest objections, what the Supreme Court is likely to do, and how the possible options risk destabilizing the country in different ways. Mentioned: Researcher application Associate engineer application “The Sweep and Force of Section Three” by William Baude and Michael Stokes Paulsen “The Case for Disqualifying Trump Is Strong” by David French “Snakebit” by Nick Catoggio Book Recommendations: Operation Pedestal by Max Hastings Into the Heart of Romans by N. T. Wright Manhunt by James L. Swanson Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs. This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” was produced by Rollin Hu. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris, with Kate Sinclair and Mary Marge Locker. Our senior engineer is Jeff Geld, with additional mixing by Efim Shapiro. Our senior editor is Claire Gordon. The show’s production team also includes Annie Galvin and Kristin Lin. Original music by Isaac Jones. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser.

Transcript

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0:00.0	From New York Times opinion, this is the Ezra Klein Show. So before we begin today we have a couple of open jobs on the show, one a
0:26.8	researcher role which will be central in our political and policy coverage in
0:31.6	2024 and an associate engineer role who will be helping
0:36.7	to engineer the show making this whole thing happen making it into actual audio that sounds good
0:42.0	if either role seems up your alley you can find the
0:44.9	links to them in our show notes.
0:47.0	I find it almost impossible to fully apprehend how crazy this political moment is.
1:01.0	So we're here, we're on the eve of the Iowa Caucus. Donald Trump is leading the
1:05.6	polls by over 30 percentage points. He leads in the New Hampshire primary. He leads
1:10.4	in the Republican race overall.
1:13.2	I mean he's breached 60 in a bunch of those polls.
1:15.6	It's a huge dominant lead.
1:17.4	He's neck-and-neck with Joe Biden when you do horse race polls for the general.
1:21.2	So Trump looks overwhelmingly likely to be the nominee for Republicans.
1:27.5	He has an even-odd shot of being the next president.
1:30.6	And at the same time, at the same time that is all happening.
1:34.0	The Colorado Supreme Court ruled that Trump is disqualified from the ballot
1:38.0	because of his efforts to overturn the election on January 6th,
1:41.0	constitutionally disqualified, no different than if he wasn't old enough.
1:46.3	In Maine, the Secretary of State followed Colorado's lead.
1:49.2	States across the country are now weighing ballot disqualification measures against Trump.
1:52.4	The Supreme Court is going to take up the case.
	...

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