she was the gloom. >> reporter: the glue for her family, as well, according to her son, jay. >> she did it all. organizing the household, outstanding cooking, grocery shopping, getting the kids where we needed to be, all while still achieving extraordinary things at work. >> reporter: o'connor died earlier this month at 93, leaving detailed instructions from the speakers to today's music. for her final sendoff. >> she also wrote her final message to her sons. our purpose in life is to help others along the way. may you each try to do the same. >> reporter: laura jarrett, nbc news. >> we need to say that one more time. our purpose in life is to help others along the way. may you each try to do the same. we will, justice o'connor, we will.

and on that note, i wish you all a very, very good night. it is an honor to be back with you. from all of our colleagues across the networks of nbc news, thank you for staying up late with me. i will see you at the end of tomorrow. >> with news out of colorado, the state supreme court has ruled that state -- donald trump should be removed from the 2024 republican primary ballot. since january 6th, there has been plenty of discussion and legal circles and even some excitement about section three of the 14th amendment of the constitution, which bans insurrectionists and people who have aided insurrectionists from holding office. there has been a whole lot of interest into whether this section of the amendment might bar donald trump from running from office because of his role in the january 6th insurrection.

the minnesota state court dismissed the idea. over in michigan, a judge ruled trump could not be taken off that state's ballot. in total, 14th amendment suits to disqualify trump have been dismissed in four states. they are pending appeal in two states and they are pending being heard in for the first time in 13 states. and just until two hours ago, it looked like colorado would go in a similar direction to what we have seen in these other states. last month in colorado the issue got a weeklong public hearing in district court and you may not have been paying attention, but there were high prideful witnesses like congressman ken buck and trump aide kash patel who spoke in trump's defense. there were witnesses for the plaintiffs, like d. c. police officer daniel hodges who was crushed in a door frame by rioters on january 6th. democratic congressman eric swalwell.

ultimately the district court judge in colorado ruled the judge had engaged in insurrection but that the 14th amendments disqualification clause in section three did not apply to the american presidency. the president was not an officer of the united states as section three stipulates he or she must be. and again just until two hours ago, that is where this case stood. but the judge's decision was appealed and the colorado supreme court, in a 4 to 3 decision, did not agree with the lower court. this is what they said in their ruling tonight. section three encompasses the office of the presidency and someone who has taken an oath as president. on this point, the district court committed reversible error. the judges continued, the district court did not err in concluding that the events at the u.s. capital on january 6th constituted an insurrection.

the district court did not err in concluding that president trump engaged in that interaction through his personal actions. president trump's speech inciting the crowd that breached the u.s. capital on january 6th was not protected by the first amendment. and they conclude that president trump is therefore disqualified from holding the office of president under section three of the 14th amendment. because he is disqualified, it would be a wrongful act under the election code for the secretary of state to list trump as a candidate on the presidential primary ballot. we do not reach these conclusions lightly. the trump campaign immediately put out a statement in response to the call the decision completely flawed and said they will swiftly file an appeal to the u.s. supreme court, which brings us to what happens now. colorado state supreme court has ruled this evening that donald trump should be removed from the state's republican primary ballot, but the actual action of removing him from

that ballot has been placed on hold until at least january 4th, or until the u.s. supreme court rules, assuming trump appeals to the justices before that date, january 4th. now according to colorado's election law, the deadline to set the list of candidates for the republican primary is january 5th. and colorado's primary itself is on super tuesday, march the 5th, which is amazingly not that far away either. so the timeframe here is very tight. does donald trump stay on the primary ballot while the supreme court decides on this? and which way does the supreme court ultimately rule? honestly, we have no idea. we really don't know what happens except that we have never been here before. joining me now is the cofounder and executive director of protect democracy, ian bassett, also joining me is mary mccord, former acting attorney general for national security and the

co-host of the essential prosecuting donald trump podcast. mary i hope you are ready to fire up the microphone with andrew weissmann given this very much brng sense that i think it caught all of us off-guard. what is your initial reaction to the state supreme court's decision here? >> well, i am not hugely surprised mostly because the lower court decision as you just indicated had really made every single finding up until the very end. the lower court had found that mr. trump engaged in an insurrection, had found that she could make that ruling and section three is something she could make a decision about how it applied under colorado law, the election code there provides for bringing a cause of action by the voters of colorado to basically force the secretary of state to keep someone off the ballot. she made all these decisions

and at the very end she just said but mr. trump, you will not -- were not in office under section three of the 14th amendment, the presidency is not an office, and you were not an officer because the presidency is not an officer. which seemed like a pretty odd ruling, that went against the plain text and went against a lot of history. so it seemed as if her ruling was pretty well supported and that the colorado supreme court, if it found that her legal conclusions were valid and her factual findings were not clear, was likely to still reverse her on the last legal conclusion about officer officer. all of that said, i think there are tough questions on both sides of this and i think that this is something the supreme court does have to take up. i think our democracy sort of demands an issue as essential as this, what name will be on the ballot for president of the united states, is should be

something that is decided by the print supreme court of the united states. and as you indicated in your opening alex, there are many other cases pending in other states. some of them may have other different state laws, i was in case for the ruling of minnesota, dismissing the case there. so in colorado, the state law gives the president a little bit of a different position than other states. but the constitutional issue should be decided by the supreme court and i think will be decided by the supreme court. >> and, do you have about an over under about whether trump 's name go out on the primary ballot and the real issue that is being litigated here is whether he is a nominee, he goes on a general election ballot. january 5th is the deadline to effectively print the ballots in colorado. asking the court to rule before then, asking the rules the courts rule quite expeditiously. >> while there is a provision

in the opinion of the supreme's colorado supreme court ruled today that is if it is not resolved the issue by january 5th that trump's name should stay on the colorado ballot in primary ballot until they resolve the issue. so this will be up to the supreme court to resolve before we dive into how the supreme court will handle it, because i agree with mary that they will have to handle it, i did another issue that at a high level, trump's mo has been a projection to accuse others of the transgressions that he himself is guilty, largely to offuscate his own guilt. so it's entirely fitting that after rising to political power, by falsely accusing barack obama to not be eligible of being president, it turns out that it's trump who a court has now determined is not eligible anymore for the presidency. in the great drum of history,

that twist is almost shakespearean in his perfection. >> that's such a great point. the irony here is thick. i take that and i hold on to that comment as we move forward here mary, but i do want to ask how you think the court is going to react here? because they have a lot that has been thrown their way in the holiday season, as trump's attorneys have been loathe to point out. the ruling from the state supreme court, i noticed this in combing through all 211 pages of it, they named czech judge gorsuch, i believe before he was on the supreme court in a ruling he made up in the section about whether states actually have the right to bump candidates off the ballot. when neil gorsuch, now supreme court justice, was a colorado state supreme judge, he held the state of colorado was absolutely in the right from keeping somebody off the ballot. it's a state case called hassan versus colorado. i will quote from it. several courts have expressly

upheld states abilities to uphold constitutionally ineligible ballots from their ballots. see hassan versus colorado. as judge courses -- recognized and has honors estates legitimate interest in protecting integrity practical and not so subtle message from one of the justices who is likely to take this up, mary? >> i think the colorado supreme court is trying to point out that at least one person was now a current justice was likely to be ruling on this case has said something that they think supports their holding. the holding that yes, the state of colorado can keep somebody off the ballot who is not constitutionally qualified. now there is a big difference between sort of objective qualifications like age and citizenship than there are for things like whether somebody

has engaged in an insurrection or rebellion against the constitution of the united states or giving aid and comfort there too. not that that is subjective in his sense but it requires some sort of determination about what that means. what is insurrection or what is a rebellion against the constitution? and of course both the lower court in colorado and supreme court did address those very questions and determined that what mr. trump had done was in fact engaging in insurrection directly actually, not just inciting it, but directly engaging in it and also that any speech he made in the context of engaging that insurrection was not protected by the first amendment. that among many other holdings. so yes, i think they were trying to be able to flag for the public and the supreme court that justice gorsuch has said things in the past that would seem to support what they are doing. but i don't think that will

stop justice gorsuch if he thinks this is different, that is not analogous because the section three disqualification being different in kind from age for example. i don't think it will stop him from saying so or thinking so. >> although in the ruling they specifically say this is akin to age or citizenship as a qualification, whether or not you incited an insurrection. ian, mary talks about this notion about, whether trump incited an insurrection and i was really struck by the language in this ruling. the degree to which they have found trump not merely guilty of inciting an insurrection, but they accuse him of overt, voluntary and direct participation in the insurrection.

maybe that's gilding the lily. i don't know ian, but separate and apart from this particular 14th amendment question, how meaningful is it that judges across the country are saying, yeah, donald trump participated and incited the insurrection? >> well, it's a very carefully written opinion and it's a very compelling opinion. the section of the opinion the you read goes chapter and verse through not only what trump did why qualified's insurrection, but why would qualifies insurrection under the understanding of the term at the time the 14th amendment was enacted. it quotes newspapers at the time, dictionaries at the time, the attorney general's understanding at the time, and it does that because it understands that the u.s. supreme court, and this is the difficult position the u.s. supreme court will be in, and the roberts majority in particular, has portrayed itself as a textualist court,

leading the course to mean what they mean, as a regionalist court, that the words should be applied as they were understood at the time of enactment. and if you do simply that, if you apply the words as they were written and understood at the time of the enacting, i think this is a very compelling case that donald trump engaged in the acts that would disqualify him from being able to hold office under the terms of the constitution. so a strict reading of the law would require the supreme court to uphold the colorado decision. obviously the supreme court does not exist in a vacuum. it exists in a political space as well and donald trump understands that. he has amassed significant political power which he is tried to use in the past to overwhelm the force of law in this country. he did that on january 6th, he has tried to steer his supporters to intimidate the judges and the court personnel in new york and d. c. and his other cases. undoubtedly, he will unleash some of his die hard followers against the supreme court as a

way of intimidating them to reach the conclusion that he wants the way he unleashed followers on the capitol on january six to try to intimidate congress into achieving the result that he wanted. and so, the real question before this u.s. supreme court as much as any interpretation of the 14th amendment of the constitution is whether the rule of law prevails, or whether the rule of the mob prevails in this country. there's nothing less than that question before the roberts court. >> well said. for anybody who hasn't read it, it is a very carefully written as you say document, but is a very damning one as well. one for the history books. monumental evening we have here in front of us. ian bastian and mary mccord, thank you very much for your expertise in all of this. i really appreciate it. we will have much more on tonight's breaking news including the political fallout over tonight's ruling. but first, congressman jamie raskin, member of the january 6th committee and a constitutional scholar, joins me to discuss what happens now.

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the breaking news tonight that donald trump has been disqualified from appearing on colorado's 2024 presidential ballot for his role in inciting an insurrection. since january 6th, a lot of legal experts and politicians have dismissed the idea that the constitution's anti-insurrection provision could actually take trump off the ballot. but there was one member of congress who did not, a member of congress who also happens to be a constitutional scholar. >> constitution itself says in section three of the 14th amendment that anyone who is sworn an oath to support the constitution and violates that oath by engaging in

insurrection or rebellion shall never be allowed to hold federal or state office again. >> not just the president but members of congress who hold federal office who engage in insurrection or rebellion having sworn an oath to uphold the constitution against enemies, foreign and domestic can never serve again. donald trump is disqualified. >> he's also constitutionally disqualified from holding office having participated in insurrection. >> joining me now is maryland congressman and member of the january 6th committee, jamie raskin. congressman raskin, does it feel like some version of vindication here to see the colorado state supreme court rule this way? >> it's definitely encouraging to see the rule of law working. the colorado supreme court justices in the majority did a really sensational job of answering every legal question and reconstituting what

happened on january 6th to explain why donald trump did engage in insurrection within the meaning of section three of the 14th amendment. but it is very powerful and exhaustive opinion dealing with everything from, it is this just really a political question up to congress, to the question of whether the president is an officer under section three of the 14th amendment, to whether he in fact engaged in an insurrection and what an insurrection means. so, i was very pleased that the rule of law was vindicated by the colorado supreme court in this way, and i would think that any u.s. supreme court justice who looks at this case through either the prism of textualism or the prism of originalism would find that the colorado supreme court has been extremely faithful to the text of the u.s. constitution and also to the original meaning of

the words that were put in by the framers of the 14th amendment. >> there's an extended situation about what the constitution meant to the framers. and it's an exhaustive opinion, on one for the history books. do you think this breathe new life to the sort of hopes of those who did not like what transpired on january 6th, to disqualify donald trump using the 14th amendment. there are multiple efforts across the states at this hour to just get him off the ballot using the 14th amendment. does this give those efforts new life? >> well, ultimately this will go to the u.s. supreme court. that seems pretty inevitable to me. i think that it certainly gives a lot of impetus to voters like the voters here in colorado to pursue this case. i think you are citing that tenth circuit opinion that was also invoked by the colorado supreme court were judge

gorsuch participated in an opinion and wrote an opinion saying that a naturalized citizen could not be put on the ballot for president because the constitution says you must be a born u.s. citizen in order to run for president. this is just a question of law. if a 14 year old tried to run for president, would that person be kept off the ballot because the constitution says you have to be 35 years old to run for president? this disqualification clause says you cannot be on the ballot for president, or you cannot serve as president if you have participated in an insurrection or rebellion against the united states. so i would think that regardless of what your politics are, what your party is, everybody should agree that this is a question of law that has to be settled by the courts. >> i've got to note that it is a 4-3 ruling for the colorado state supreme court. there are three judges who

dissented. i believe all of them were appointed by democratic governors. does that suggest to you that it isn't that cut and dry? that isn't just a matter of seeing the law as it is, and in this context? >> well, the judges disagree of course and there are very few significant supreme court opinions where you don't have some dissenters in it. it is true that there are a whole bunch of new legal issues. this is what we call a case of first impression because no president before has ever tried to overthrow his own government. so it does raise a whole new series of interpretive challenges for the courts. i was just impressed by the way this court got into them in such a deep way. for example, the question that the lower court got hung up on whether the president is an officer within the meaning of section three of the 14th amendment. they found it easy because they identified 25 different places in the constitution where the president or the presidency are

considered to be officers or an office under the constitution, and of course, it would be intrinsically illogical for the president to be the only person not to be covered by section three the 14th amendment. they did a very fine job of dealing with the argument that because the presidential oath slightly differs that somehow it distinguishes him, when in fact in all of those cases, everybody who is swearing an oath to the constitution is swearing an oath to support it including the president. >> the tldr summary of that officer's actions, are you kidding me? the president is clearly an officer. they write, it seems most likely that the presidency is not most likely included in section three because there is so much evidence that it is an office. duh! i know that you pointed out that the position doesn't just include the president but other elected officials. i wonder if there are other members of congress down-ballot

whose names could be stripped as well of the supreme court opposes state supreme courts ruling? >> i don't know the answer to that because i don't have all the specific facts in those cases. what's amazing about this opinion is how meticulously the court reconstructs what the president's actions were, not just in inciting the insurrection but egging it along, trying to get the president to step out, even calling u.s. senators to keep it going. >> yeah. it is a damning assessment of the president's role in the insurrection, more than just inciting. congressman jamie raskin, thank you for your time tonight. >> thank you. >> coming up. we will be joined by the woman whose name appears as a defendant on today's ruling. colorado secretary of state jena griswold. she will weigh in on what she intends to do in the wake of tonight's decision. that is next.

we are following that breaking news out of colorado where the state supreme court ruled that donald trump cannot appear in the state's primary ballot because of his attempt to overturn the 2020 election. that ruling reverses a lower court's order that concluded trump had engaged in insurrection but could not be disqualified from holding office. now in response to that lower court ruling, it had the

president the and in the lacey 's brought discipline piece for the washington post. joining me now is sherrilyn ifill, endowed chair in civil rights at howard university. sherrilyn, thank you so much for being here. once you have the 14th

amendment centre in your title, we know this is bigger than just this case quite obviously. i very much want to talk about the racial underpinnings of this law and the way the people have forgotten january 6th was a concerted public effort to disenfranchise votes of a coalition, a multi racial coalition of voters powered in large part by black votes. and it's almost as if people have forgotten that history when they sort of question how and why and whether the 14th amendment is applicable in this case. but it seems to be quite obvious that there is a racial element that echoes very directly back to the sort of intention when it was written. >> yes, the reconstruction congress understood that the spirit of insurrection in the south was obviously tied to the issue of slavery and to the question of black people and their citizenship. and likewise, january 6th pulled those two threads and trump pulled those threads by

inciting an insurrection and by inciting an insurrection on the theory that he had been cheated by voters in atlanta and philadelphia and detroit and milwaukee and by ruby freeman and shaye moss, who he called hustlers. the racial underpinnings of trump's theory were very much on display for anyone who wanted to see it, and i would say even in the final days of the civil war, it would've been ng a appalling to see a confederate flag paraded through the united states congress as we saw on january 6th. that reconstruction congress was very serious, very clear. they had looked in the face of insurrection and had determined that we needed something to protect the new democracy that these civil war amendments were designed to create. so many of us learned about the 14th amendment. we know about equal protection

and birthright citizenship and due process, but we don't learn about the sections of the 14th amendment that were created by those framers to allow us to have the tools we need to protect our democracy against precisely the kind of actions that donald trump engaged in. >> you would think in a way that if it was obamawho donald trump was trying to unseat rather than joe biden it would be more obvious for people sitting on the supreme court to understand the direct racial element or pre-post racial society, racist goal that lay at the heart of january 6th insurrection. i want to ask given how the supreme court is treated the issue of race in the last year, effectively saying that there was a post racial side taking it into account and hiring decision, cellege admissions. how optimistic are you that they are going to understand this in this strictly constitutional way in which it

was written? >> i am very gratified by the colorado supreme court's decision. it is, as representative raskin saidg, a careful and meticulous decision. it is airtight. this is really a test for our supreme court, and in years past the supreme court has recognized the need, particular in cases involving the president, in some instances to rise above partisanship. but i wanted to be clear about two things, this is not about partisanship. this is about the words of our constitution. that's number one. number two, this case does not require you to believe that trump is racist or the insurrection was racist. that's not part of this case. participation in an insurrection makes you inellegible if you form league took an oath of office to return to office that either the federal or state level. that's what section three of the 14th amendment says. it is like having to be 35 to

be president. if trump were 34, he could not be on the ballot. he participated in an insurrection, he cannot be on the ballot. and of course the irony is that it was trump who, for many years, falsely accused president obama of not being eligible to be president because he lacked, as mr. trump charged at that time, birthright citizenship. this is about eligibility. the qualifications to be president, to have been born in this, country, to be 35 years old, and after the civil war, those framers added another eligibility requirement, which is that you have to be loyal to the constitution of the united states. so, this doesn't require the court to engage in any racial analysis. it requires them to uphold the words of the 14th amendment, and i want to really congratulate the lawyers at crew, noah bookbinder, donald sherman and the entire crew for being courageous enough and clear enough to pursue this case and reporting on such an airtight case before the court.

this is a test of our united states supreme court, not of donald trump at this point, not of the lawyers in the case, not of colorado and we will have to see what happens. >> we sure will. sherrilyn ifill, thank you for your time tonight, i appreciate it. >> thank you alex. >> coming up next we will be joined by one of the parties at the very center of this ruling, colorado secretary of state jena griswold. don't go anywhere.

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latest campaign rally in waterloo, iowa. the former president spoke for more than an hour, but he had absolutely nothing to say about the most consequential decision of the 2024 election today, just handed down this evening, by the colorado supreme court. that court ruled that trump is disqualified from serving as president and removed him from the state's 2024 primary ballot under a provision as the 14th amendment. there are a lot of other 14th amendment challenges to trump's candidacy that are still pending. but this colorado ruling marks the first time such a challenge has been successful. in response, republicans tonight are rallying behind trump, calling the decision on un-american in a partisan attack. joining me now is claire mccaskill, former democratic senator from missouri. claire, thank you for making the time. first of all, what is your reaction to this ruling? and secondly, calling a states

supreme decision a partisan attack, what do you make of that? >> well, first of all, it's not surprising that he is going to call this a partisan attack. anything that happens to him is a partisan attack. he never does anything wrong. it is always people that are doing things wrong to him. he is the ultimate victim and tries to be a martyr, always, but when i look at this decision, alex, i kind of have two hats. one hat is the lawyer who had to pass the bar exam and his head to hold my hand up and take an oath to uphold the constitution a number of times in my career. the irony of this decision is, it is so steeped in the very theories that this supreme court seems to hold closest to them. and that is originalism and contextual-ism. textualism.

if you look, for example, at the gun case that clarence thomas wrote, i think he rode it, where he said no gun laws can be passed that don't fit within the ideas of the original framers of the constitution. they've gone to great lengths to say they are all about originalism and they're all about textualism but the prey plain words say what the framers intended. this decision is masterpiece in terms of playing those two cards on the table and explaining very clearly why this is exactly what the framers had in mind. this is exactly what the 14th amendment was supposed to stop, someone who tried to overturn the government coming back and trying to take over the government again. so it will be very interesting to see how the supreme court handles. it's definitely a difficult one, i think, for them, on that basis. then the other hat i have is the political hat. this decision worries me on a

political basis. human nature always wants what it can't have. and i'm worried that there will be too many people in this country that maybe will not take the time to really understand the scary contrast that donald trump represents compared to joe biden in his competent and stable leadership and then they will just see this as oh, they're after him. oh, they're after him. they're going to great lengths to keep him from us. and yeah, well, maybe i should vote for this guy just because they're working so hard to keep him off the ballot. i'm worried about the political reaction of this decision and how our country will handle that. >> you can be sure the trump is going to further weaponize that initial knee-jerk political reaction because it serves his ends. rick scott saying tonight, if this is the path that rack radical dems use to weaponize the courts against conservatives, where we all no better than the socialists

regime regimes in venezuela and cubans. they're not after, me there after. trump is just in the way. you this combined with the criminal cases and criminal trials, you can imagine a maelstrom, a ready-made hurricane that trump will site is evidence of just how badly the democrats and the courts that they control wish to keep him away from the white house. >> yeah, and people need to realize, this lawsuit was brought by republicans. i believe it was six republican voters and one independent voter. there were no democrat plaintiffs in this. this was republicans. so this really is about the law. and when you don't like the law, you say it's being used against you. when you respect the law you realize that this is what happens to someone who did what donald trump to, no matter what the party was. >> you know, it is worth noting, for people noting this is a democratic, the three judges

were all appointed by democrat partisans of colorado. trending on partisan lines is not. the great claire mccaskill, thank you very much tonight, my friend. we'll be back with colorado secretary of state janet griswold. that's next. life tosses lemons your way. cirkul. it's your water, your way. i got this $1,000 camera for only $41 on dealdash. dealdash.com, online auctions since 2009. this playstation 5

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breaking news tonight and historic decision the colorado supreme court has ruled that donald trump must be removed from the states republican primary ballot under section three of the 14th amendment of the constitution. in a 4 to 3 decision the court said it would be a wrongful act to list trump as a candidate, effectively disqualifying him, almost immediately trump announcing he would appeal this decision to the supreme court. now the statutory deadline for submitting names for colorado's primary ballots is january 5th. so what is colorado's secretary of state, state jena griswold, do now? let's ask her. joining me now is colorado

secretary of state jena griswold. madam secretary, thank you for joining me. what do you do now? >> well, as long as there is not another case, trump is disqualified from the ballot. the colorado supreme court affirmed the district court's decision that he engaged in insurrection. the fact of the matter is, he incited the insurrection to try to stop the peaceful transfer of the presidency. in the colorado supreme court has decided that those actions are disqualifying. so, again, as of now, he is not a qualified candidate in the state of colorado. of course the u.s. supreme court may choose to review, and i will follow whatever court order or decision that is in place at the time of certification. >> you are deadline of where when you have to decide what names to put on the ballot is january 5th. there is a stay on this until january 4th. can you walk me through the

scenarios here if the supreme court does not decide whether it's going to review this or not by january 5th? or, sorry, i should use the latter, if the supreme court does decide it's going to review it but has not issued a decision by january 5th, that means that trump's name goes on the primary ballot. is that correct? >> if the united states supreme court decides to take this case, i am sure that they will consider that certification in the state of colorado is very quickly approaching and will issue an order or a decision quickly to make sure that we are in compliance with the law. if they take the case we will make clear to the court the deadlines and the timelines. you know, the bigger thing is if the court does not take the case. as of january 5th, if the u. s. supreme court does not take the case or intervene, donald trump will not be on the presidential primary ballot.

and frankly, this case is only here because trump's actions himself. he is the person who has led to this decision that he is disqualified because he tried to steal the presidency from the american people. >> i do have to ask you, given how open and shut proponents of the 14th amendment in this case are, the dissent from, for example, chief justice bold right who offered, i believe, the descent, he says that he says the applicable section of colorado code was not an act to decide whether a candidate engaged in insurrection. he does not agree with the disqualification as a proper line of action. but do you think there's any merit to it? does it give you any pause as the secretary of state? >> as secretary of state i will always follow the law in the united states constitution. that includes following the majority decision in a case.

under colorado law my office routinely checks if a candidate is eligible for the office that they are looking to serve in. so, for example, if arnold schwarzenegger wanted to be on the presidential primary ballot, we would not allow him because under the united states constitution he is not a qualified candidate because he is not a natural born citizen. this is a very similar situation. does the u.s. constitution qualify someone to serve in an office or disqualify them? the colorado supreme court has said section three out of 14th amendment disqualifies donald trump because he engaged in insurrection. so following that i do believe that colorado law allows following the united states constitution when we're deciding are ballot content. >> right. given your feelings about the merits of the state supreme court ruling tonight, i wonder what we'll do if the supreme court decides to overturn? him >> i agree with the

colorado supreme court's decision. i have said time and time again that i believe that donald trump incited the insurrection. and also there shouldn't be some loophole in the u.s. constitution an allowing the president but no one else to engage an insurrection and then serve in office again. but with that said, i will follow the law and the united states constitution because unlike donald trump i believe that elected officials should be doing. and if a court decides that he is on the ballot i will follow that. i swear to uphold the constitution. that is exactly what i will do. and i think donald trump, when he swore to uphold the constitution, should ask himself whether he has been successful on his oath of office. >> you sound optimistic that you're gonna get a ruling from the supreme court on this

before colorado has to decide whether trump's name is on the ballot. is that correct? >> i am optimistic that will have great elections in colorado no matter what. we are considered the nations gold standard of elections for voter access and security. courts tend to understand that there is a quickness in decision-making that has to happen when it comes to elections. so whether or not the united states supreme court decides to review the case, whether or not they issue a decision by january 5th, if they do review the case i believe that they will issue some type of order or be cognizant of the fact that we have an election that is quickly approaching where a super tuesday state with a january 5th deadline for ballots certification. >> we will be watching to see what happens. and that is an understatement. colorado secretary of state jena griswold, thank you again for your time.