Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) on Sunday said he believes former President Trump is “absolutely” disqualified from running for the White House due to his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
CNN’s Dana Bash asked Raskin on “State of the Union” whether he agreed with GOP presidential candidate Asa Hutchinson’s assessment that Trump could be disqualified from running for office due to the 14th Amendment, which states that no one can be elected to the presidency if they “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”
“Well, absolutely, and we’ve been saying all along that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment presents a clear and unequivocal statement that anyone who has sworn an oath of office, and by the way not just the president but members of Congress and others who hold federal office, who engage in insurrection or rebellion, having sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution against enemies foreign and domestic, can never serve again in federal or state office,” Raskin told Bash.
“And this was added after the Civil War as a general constitutional principle, and we have to abide by it. Donald Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives for inciting an insurrection against the union, and then 57 of 100 senators determined as a constitutional fact that Donald Trump had incited an insurrection,” he continued.
Hutchinson has previously questioned whether Trump is qualified to be president due to the 14th Amendment, saying that legal scholars have determined the former president is not eligible because of his role on Jan. 6. Raskin echoed that argument, pointing to legal experts who have also claimed that Trump has disqualified himself.
“So I think you’ve got robust, bicameral, bipartisan majorities that have already established this as a fact, and I agree with the conservative Federalist Society law professors who are out there saying as well as Mr. Hutchinson that Donald Trump is disqualified just as if he were running and not a born U.S. citizen or if he were running and he were 24 years old,” Raskin added.
Trump was indicted on four federal charges earlier this month over his alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election that culminated in the riots at the Capitol on Jan. 6.