Jan. 5 (UPI) — Voters in Illinois and Massachusetts filed petitions to remove former President Donald Trump from Republican primary ballots in their state.
The organization Free Speech for People, which has led challenge efforts to Trump’s eligibility in states around the country based on the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, assisted the suits filed by five voters in Illinois and a group of voters in Massachusetts Thursday.
The Illinois voters filed an objection petition with the Illinois State Board of Election to remove Trump’s name from the March 19 Republican primary ballot, alleging that Trump’s actions on Jan. 6, 2021, amounted to insurrection, which would bar him from office.
It also cited the Dec. 19 decision by the Colorado Supreme Court and the Dec. 28 decision made by the Maine Secretary of State, which ruled that Trump is ineligible for its ballot, based on the same claims.
“Thus, the only two decisions evaluating Section 3 challenges that reached the merits of the challenge and assessed evidence from both candidate Trump and objectors determined that Trump is constitutionally barred from office,” said the petition.
In Massachusetts, a similar petition was filed with the state’s Ballot Law Commission with civil rights attorney Shannon Liss-Riordan by a group of voters that includes former Boston Mayor Kim Janey and two law professors.
“Today’s legal action is not about partisan politics but about upholding the Constitution, and that is why Massachusetts voters across the political spectrum have joined together to challenge Donald Trump’s wrongful placement on the Massachusetts ballot,” Liss-Riordan said in a statement on Thursday.
While Minnesota and Michigan have ruled against Free Speech for People there, the organization said those courts made those decisions on procedural grounds and not the facts of the case.
On Wednesday, Trump filed an appeal of Colorado’s decision to the U.S. Supreme Court in hopes of getting a ruling that would affect all of the challenges against him based on the 14th Amendment. His campaign has called the Colorado disqualification “unAmerican” and “unconstitutional.”