Colorado GOP to Change to Caucus System, Ditch Primary If Trump Kept Off Ballot

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump arrives at a campaign event at the Hyatt Hotel in Coralville, Iowa, on Dec. 13, 2023. Scott Olson/Getty Images

The Colorado Republican Party indicated that it would switch from a primary ballot system to a caucus system if former President Donald Trump is kept off state ballots.

On Dec. 19, the Colorado Supreme Court barred President Trump from appearing on state ballots in a 4–3 decision. On Dec. 20, GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy criticized the court decision, threatening to withdraw from the Colorado GOP primary until President Trump is also allowed on the ballot. In response, the Colorado Republican Party wrote in a Dec. 20 post on X, formerly known as Twitter, “You won’t have to because we will withdraw from the Primary as a Party and convert to a pure caucus system if this is allowed to stand.”

A primary is a state-level election in which party members choose a candidate who will run in the general election. A caucus system is basically a local meeting during which a party’s registered members from a city, town, or county vote for their preferred candidate.

Opting for a caucus will thus allow them to bypass the primary ballot issue regarding President Trump. The GOP members can then elect the former president for the 2024 race.

The Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling to bar President Trump from the state ballot makes Colorado the first state to take such an action.

The decision was based on the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits individuals who have engaged in “insurrection” from taking public office.

The ruling overturned an earlier decision by a district court that found that President Trump incited an insurrection because of his alleged involvement in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol breach but said he could not be barred from ballots. The district court argued that it was unclear whether the 14th Amendment would apply in such a situation.

There have been sustained efforts to keep President Trump off the ballot in other states, also citing the 14th Amendment. None had succeeded until the recent Colorado verdict.

In a Dec. 20 X post, Mr. Ramaswamy called the decision to bar President Trump from the Colorado ballot “an unconstitutional maneuver that is a bastardization of the 14th Amendment to our U.S. Constitution.”

He pointed out that the 14th Amendment’s Section 3 provision was designed to bar Confederate members from taking office—a completely different scenario.

“The basic principle that we the people select our leadership, not the unelected elite class in the back of palace halls, that’s Old World Europe, not the United States. That’s why I’m making a pledge today that I will withdraw. I pledge to withdraw from the Colorado GOP primary ballot unless and until Trump’s name is restored,” Mr. Ramaswamy said.

“And I demand that Ron DeSantis and Chris Christie and Nikki Haley do the same thing, or else these Republicans are simply complicit in this unconstitutional attack on the way we conduct our constitutional republic. I refuse to be complicit in that. I think what they’re doing is wrong.”

The Colorado Supreme Court is composed of Democratic appointees. In a Dec. 20 X post, Mr. Ramaswamy criticized the “cabal of Democrat judges” for barring President Trump.

“Today’s decision is the latest election interference tactic to silence political opponents and swing the election for whatever puppet the Democrats put up this time by depriving Americans of the right to vote for their candidate of choice,” he said.

Judgment Against Trump

In the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision, the three dissenting judges voiced serious concerns about the move to block President Trump from state ballots.

Justice Brian D. Boatright pointed out that the 14th Amendment’s Section 3 provision “was not enacted to decide whether a candidate engaged in insurrection ... In my view, this cause of action should have been dismissed.”

Justice Maria E. Berkenkotter disagreed that Colorado’s election laws give state courts the authority to decide whether a candidate can appear in a presidential primary ballot under the 14th Amendment’s Section 3 clause.

She said that the state Legislature didn’t confer such power to the court, which would make the ruling an error.

Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung called the Colorado Supreme Court decision “flawed” and said the campaign will “swiftly file” an appeal against the ruling in the U.S. Supreme Court. “We have full confidence that the U.S. Supreme Court will quickly rule in our favor and finally put an end to these unAmerican lawsuits,” he said.

The Colorado court’s decision has been stayed until Jan. 4 “pending any review by the U.S. Supreme Court.” If the U.S. Supreme Court agrees to review the ruling by then, Colorado will be required to allow President Trump’s name in the primary ballot. Otherwise, he would be removed.

In a Dec. 20 X post, legal analyst Jonathan Turley called the Colorado Supreme Court decision “dead wrong.”

“The opinion of the Colorado Supreme Court is so sweeping that it would allow for tit-for-tat removals of candidates from ballots,” he warned. “The result is lack of a limiting principle. I view the opinion as strikingly anti-democratic in what it now allows states to do in blue and red states alike.”

“These justices barred voters from being [able] to vote for their preferred candidate in the name of democracy. It is like burning down a house in the name of fire safety,” he said in another post.

Investigative journalist Laura Loomer said in an X post that she expects the Colorado court decision against President Trump to “backfire even more than what the indictments and arrests have.”

“Democrats, Libertarians, and Independents are now uniting around President Trump following this unprecedented act of ELECTION INTERFERENCE,” she said.