By Donald Trump got support from an unexpected person. California Governor Newsom told Democrats in the Golden State to stop trying to prevent the former president from being on the ballot.
Earlier in the week, Democrats on the Supreme Court ruled that Trump was not eligible for the presidency under a dubious interpretation of the 14th Amendment.
The Washington Post explained: “In a historic 4-3 decision, the state’s highest court ruled that Trump is ineligible to be president — and therefore ineligible to appear on the ballot as a presidential candidate — because he engaged in an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, violating the part of the U.S. Constitution that prohibits insurrectionists from holding high office.”
The last time we saw Newsom, he was being beaten so severely in a national debate by Ron DeSantis that his wife threw in the towel. Is this the case of “an enemy of my enemy is my friend?”
Politico writes:
“There is no doubt that Donald Trump is a threat to our liberties and even to our democracy,” Newsom said, “but in California, we defeat candidates at the polls. Everything else is a political distraction.”
His remarks threw cold water on numerous attempts by elected officials to seize on the Colorado decision.
Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, who is running for governor in 2026, issued a letter urging California Secretary of State Shirley Weber to “explore every legal option” to remove Trump from the ballot. Democratic state Sen. Dave Min, an Orange County congressional candidate, said he would introduce a bill letting California residents sue to block ineligible candidates — although given the legislative calendar, it is all but impossible for such a measure to be passed and take effect in time to apply to the March 5 presidential primary.
Months before the Colorado ruling was handed down, a group of Democratic state legislators urged California Attorney General Rob Bonta to use his powers to expedite a ruling on whether Trump was ineligible to appear on the ballot.
Newsom’s support comes following the Supreme Court handing Donald Trump a significant victory. On Friday, the Court declined special counsel Jack Smith’s request to expedite the arguments regarding Donald Trump’s immunity from federal prosecution for alleged crimes he committed while in office. The decision is expected to delay Trump’s trial, potentially until after the election.
The Justices did not explain their decision, and no dissents were recorded.
“The court’s decision is a major blow to Smith,” noted CNN, “who made an extraordinary gamble when he asked the justices to take the rare step of skipping a federal appeals court and quickly deciding a fundamental issue in his election subversion criminal case against Trump.
Both sides will still have the option of appealing an eventual ruling by the DC Circuit Court of Appeals up to the high court, but the court’s move is a major victory for Trump, whose strategy of delay in the criminal case included mounting a protracted fight over the immunity question, which must be settled before his case goes to trial.
An expedited review of the issue is already underway at the DC Circuit, which has scheduled oral arguments for January 9. The election subversion trial is currently set to begin in March.”
“The real question is what happens then,” Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at the University of Texas School of Law told the news channel. “Assuming the Court of Appeals rejects Trump’s claim, will it keep the trial on hold pending further review from the Supreme Court, or will it allow the trial to go forward and force Trump to seek a stay from the Supreme Court? It’s still possible that the trial begins on March 4, but the Supreme Court’s apparent willingness to let the DC Circuit go first makes it at least somewhat – and perhaps significantly – less likely.”
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