(Bloomberg): The courtroom drama of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green and her challenge to Georgia’s post-Civil War ban on civil servants supporting the rebellion is over.
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The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals said Thursday that Greene’s case is moot, noting that Greene won a lawsuit that tried to block him from running for re-election this year. However, one judge suggested she would side with Republican lawmakers, providing a roadmap that other candidates could compete for over their ability to serve.
Green took part in the November 8 election ballot and successfully defended her eligibility against challenges from Georgia voters, winning the Republican primary.
Voters claimed Green played a key role in spurring the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol. In the attack, supporters of former President Donald Trump broke into a building as Congress was meeting to approve his 2020 presidential election, which Joe Biden won.
Voters attempted to disqualify Green through state laws allowing for challenge of voting eligibility, invoking the Riot disqualification provision of the 14th Amendment. A state administrative law judge ruled that voters failed to present sufficient evidence. State officials and courts have refused to block that decision.
Meanwhile, a federal judge considered riot disqualification and ruled unlikely to win her broader challenge to Georgia’s ability to potentially enforce, giving Green an injunction to halt the state’s process. refused to give
Greene appealed to the 11th Circuit Court, and on Thursday a three-judge panel ruled the case moot after she retained her place in the vote. The panel featured two candidates for former President Donald Trump, Justices Elizabeth Branch and Barbara Lagore, and Justice Charles Wilson, who confirmed under former President Bill Clinton.
However, Branch said he believed Green was entitled to an injunction because Georgia unconstitutionally “violated the role of Congress in determining legislative eligibility.”
Branch argued that Georgia was erroneously trying to add a “substantial qualification” to Green’s eligibility to run for public office, which contradicted the “escape hatch” in the 14th Amendment disqualification language, and that Congress could I wrote that a two-thirds majority vote would allow it to be overruled. Chamber.
Green’s attorney James Bopp Jr. wrote that although the case was controversial, “we are grateful, however, to at least one judge who agreed with us on the merits.” Representatives for the Georgia secretary of state and the attorney general’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
John Bonifaz, president of Free Speech, an advocacy group representing Georgia voters, said Green viewed his failure to overturn the lower court’s ruling as a “huge victory.” The district judge’s decision is non-binding, but Bonifaz said it features “significant” findings that other judges and lawyers may cite in the future.
Bonifaz said that if Trump formally announced his intention to run for president in 2024, Free Speech would file disqualification appeals in multiple states.
In September, a local official in Otero County, New Mexico, became the first person involved in the Jan. 6 attacks to be removed from office for rioting language. Griffin was convicted of a misdemeanor for illegally staying in the Capitol.
Early on Thursday, the Citizens’ Council on Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a government watchdog group involved in the Griffin scandal, announced it would pursue a disqualification challenge to keep Trump out of the vote again.
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