Moments after we learned on Dec. 19 that the Colorado Supreme Court by a vote of 4–3 had banned former President Donald Trump from their state’s ballot, fellow candidate entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy jumped into the fray.
Mr. Ramaswamy stated he would withdraw his name from the Colorado GOP primary ballot for as long as President Trump’s was ... well, let’s use the appropriate term for what actually happened ... canceled.
Meanwhile, Mr. Ramaswamy went further, issuing a challenge to his competition: “I pledge to withdraw from the Colorado GOP primary ballot until Trump is also allowed on the ballot, and I demand that Ron DeSantis, Chris Christie and Nikki Haley do the same immediately—or else they are tacitly endorsing this illegal maneuver which will have disastrous consequences for our country.”
True enough.
Bu Mr. Ramaswamy’s pledge became somewhat irrelevant because, later, we heard from the Colorado Republican Party that should President Trump’s cancellation (sticking with the accurate term here) not be overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court, they would replace their primary with a caucus over which their Supreme Court had no power. All would be able to compete.
Good on them.
In the no response, the candidates other than Mr. Ramaswamy showed their true colors.
To a man and woman, they revealed themselves to be more interested in their personal advancement, or in pleasing their donors, than in the preservation of this constitutional republic—tenuous as it currently is.
How tenuous?
The other three candidates, seemingly disinterested in powder kegs, are keeping their powder dry, dealing with a challenge to our Constitution in half measures, what we might call mealy-mouthed responses.
Note the “probably.”
As for Ms. Haley, the Des Moines Register tells us she said in Iowa, “We don’t need to have judges making these decisions; we need voters to make these decisions.”
Carefully crafted, no? (And what voters did she mean? Rumors are flying via Fox’s Charles Gasparino and others that Ms. Haley is considering a third-party run.)
Yes, it should. But in that there’s a greater danger. What if SCOTUS, in its dreary desire to seem even-handed, uses this as an excuse to tilt left on more ominous decisions, such as those being raised by special prosecutor Jack Smith?
In the meantime, as I’ve written, as of now there’s no response by the other candidates to Vivek Ramaswamy’s pledge. They’re fortunate the Colorado GOP gave them an out.
We don’t know what these three would do should SCOTUS let the Colorado Supreme Court decision stand. My best guess is they would grumble, largely for show, but let their names remain on the ballot in the hopes, vain at this point it would seem, that it would make a national impact.
As for Mr. Ramaswamy, his campaign has had its ups and downs. But it seems to be having its ups again with this response and his well-received, concentrated attacks on the legacy media.
The long-term upshot of his righting his ship looks increasingly positive, although it provides little threat to President Trump.
And as for the left, when they make outlandish decisions/cancellations such as this, you have to wonder if their conscious/subconscious wish is for civil war.
That would seem to be what the normally judicious Mr. Turley was implying in his reference to “powder kegs.”
