Norma Anderson, a trailblazing former GOP legislator, is among the Colorado voters who have challenged the Republican front-runner’s candidacy in a case that will be heard by the Supreme Court
Former Colorado legislator Norma Anderson is the unlikely face of a challenge to the Trump campaign that the Supreme Court will hear Thursday. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post)
LAKEWOOD, Colo. — Norma Anderson left the Colorado legislature nearly two decades ago, but she still keeps a copy of the state’s statutes in her home office. She carries a pocket Constitution in her purse. She has another copy, slightly larger with images of the Founding Fathers on the cover, that she leaves on a table in her sitting room so she can consult it when she watches TV.
She’s turned down a page corner in that copy to mark the spot where the 14th Amendment appears. She has rereadit several times since joining a lawsuit last year that cites the amendment in seeking to stop Donald Trump from running for president.
Anderson, 91, is the unlikely face of a challenge to Trump’s campaign that will be heard by the Supreme Court on Thursday. She was a force in Colorado politics for decades, serving as the first female majority leader in both chambers of the legislature. She is a Republican but has long been skeptical of Trump and believes he is an insurrectionist whocrossed a verboten line on Jan. 6, 2021, that should bar him from holding office again.
Vehivavy repoblikana, Norma Anderson, no mety hampandamoka ny filatsahan’i Donald Trump ho Filoha amerikana indray: « manapotika ny demokrasia sy ny fototra iorenan’ny repoblika izy », hoy Ramatoa.
“He tried to overturn an election,” she said. “The very first time I ever ran, I didn’t win. I didn’t go out and try to change the election. I said, ‘Whoops, work harder next time, lady.’”
The 2024 election could turn on whether the Supreme Court agrees with Anderson and five other Republican and independent voters who persuaded Colorado’s top court to rule that Trump is ineligible to run again. The justices — three of whom were nominated by Trump — are expected to quickly decide the historic Trump v. Andersoncase, with their ruling likely to apply across all 50 states.
Although considered a legal long shot, a decision in Anderson’s favor would jolt American politics by preventing the GOP front-runner from continuing his campaign. However the justices rule, they are likely to displease a large chunk of an intensely polarized electorate.
The case is built on the 14th Amendment, which was adopted three years after the end of the Civil War to guarantee rights for the formerly enslaved and to prevent former Confederates from returning to power. That latter provision, known as Section 3, is written broadly to say that those who engage in insurrection after taking an oath to support the Constitution cannot hold office.
Anderson’s lawsuit, brought with the help of the group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), argues that Trump can’t appear on Colorado’s March 5 primary ballot because he engaged in insurrection before and during the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Colorado’s high court agreed in a 4-3 ruling in December, and Trump appealed the case to the Supreme Court.
Section 3 was dormant for more than a century but received new attention after Jan. 6. CREW spearheaded a lawsuit in 2022 that bounced a county commissioner in New Mexico out of office because of his role in the attack on the Capitol.
Eric Olson, an attorney for the group of Colorado voters, argues the case before the state Supreme Court in December. (David Zalubowski/AP/Pool)
The debates over whether Section 3 can block Trump from office have not always followed clean ideological lines. Some prominent conservative scholars have contended that Trump should be deemed ineligible for office, even as some liberals have argued that the best way to shore up democracy is to defeat Trump at the ballot box.
Polls show the country is split on whether Trump should be disqualified. The former president has called the attempts in Colorado and other states to remove him from the ballot an anti-democratic attempt to interfere with the election.
Before attorney Mario Nicolais approached Norma Anderson to be part of the lawsuit seeking to bar Trump from the ballot, he asked Pam Anderson, the 2022 Republican nominee for Colorado secretary of state. She decided not to do it but suggested Nicolais try her mother-in-law. Nicolais,a research analystfor Rudy Giuliani’s 2008 presidential campaign who is now working with CREW, was thrilled to learn a Republican luminary might consider signing on and called Norma Anderson. She agreed on the spot.
“The short answer was ‘Yes,’” Nicolais said. “And the long answer was ‘Hell yes.’”
TANIKO Madagascar 