Trump Asks Supreme Court to Keep Him on Colorado Ballot

Former President Donald J. Trump asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to keep him on the primary ballot in Colorado, appealing an explosive ruling from the state Supreme Court declaring him ineligible based on his efforts to overturn the 2020 election that culminated in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

The move adds to the growing pressure on the U.S. Supreme Court to act, given the number of challenges to Mr. Trump’s eligibility and the need for a nationwide resolution of the question as the primaries approach.

Mr. Trump’s petition seeking review of the state court’s ruling followed a similar one last week from the Colorado Republican Party. The six voters who had prevailed in the Colorado Supreme Court filed a motion urging the justices to put the case on an exceptionally fast track.

In a separate ruling last week, an election official in Maine agreed with the Colorado court that Mr. Trump is ineligible for another term. Mr. Trump appealed the decision from Maine to a state court there on Tuesday. Both rulings are on hold while appeals move forward, giving the U.S. Supreme Court some breathing room.

The cases turn on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. Adopted after the Civil War, it bars those who had taken an oath “to support the Constitution of the United States” from holding office if they then “shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”

Congress can remove the prohibition, the provision says, but only by a two-thirds vote in each chamber.

By a 4-to-3 vote, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled in December that the provision applied to Mr. Trump, making his ineligible for another term.

“We do not reach these conclusions lightly,” the majority