Trump to appeal Maine decision removing him from ballot

Former President Trump’s campaign said it will appeal the Maine secretary of state’s Thursday decision to bar him from the state’s primary ballot.

Secretary of State Shenna Bellows (D) determined Thursday that Trump’s actions surrounding the Jan. 6 Capitol riots violated the 14th Amendment’s clause barring those who “assist insurrection” from holding office.

The Trump campaign quickly denounced the decision, attacking Bellows as a “virulent leftist and a hyper-partisan Biden-supporting Democrat.”

“We are witnessing, in real-time, the attempted theft of an election and the disenfranchisement of the American voter,” spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement. “Make no mistake, these partisan election interference efforts are a hostile assault on American democracy.”

Cheung said the campaign will appeal the ruling.

“We know both the Constitution and the American people are on our side in this fight,” he continued. “President Trump’s dominating campaign has a commanding lead in the polls that has dramatically expanded as Crooked Joe Biden’s presidency continues to fail.”

Bellows argued that Trump “used a false narrative of election fraud to inflame his supporters” and “was aware of the likelihood for violence and at least initially supported its use given he both encouraged it with incendiary rhetoric and took no timely action to stop it.”

Attorneys for Trump previously demanded that Bellows, a Democrat, recuse herself from the decision over whether Trump should be placed on the ballot. In the Thursday decision, Bellows said that the request was “untimely.”

“Had the motion been timely, I would have determined that I could preside over this matter impartially and without bias,” she wrote. “My decision is based exclusively on the record before me, and it has in no way been influenced by my political affiliation or personal views about the events of January 6, 2021.”