Judicial Watched filed a lawsuit to stop California from interfering in the outcome of the 2020 elections.
Apparently, the Golden State wants to keep Trump off the ballot in order to sway the final results.
It’s a brazen push from California lawmakers. Gov. Gavin Newsome signed a bill that states “any candidate who wants to run in the state’s presidential primary must first release his/her tax returns.” Of course, this law is aimed squarely at President Trump.
Too bad lawmakers missed the window to pass similar legislation aimed at birth records, or better yet, full accounting of charitable organizations.
Obviously, such rules seek to narrow the field. And this is California’s last-ditch effort to exclude Trump because the chances of beating him are slim to none.
Unconstitutional Move
Forget that such a move is unethical. More importantly, it’s unconstitutional. Like most of you, I remember reading the constitution in high school, and no where in it did I see “release tax returns” as a requirement of running for president.
But for argument’s sake, I took a second look since I left high school a few decades ago.
Legal requirements for presidential candidates have remained the same since the year Washington accepted the presidency. As directed by the Constitution, a presidential candidate must be a natural born citizen of the United States, a resident for 14 years, and 35 years of age or older.
Ironically, Democrat candidates such as Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and others have not released their tax returns yet; but only Trump is ridiculed.
Enter Judicial Watch
Obviously, Judicial Watch stepped in because California passed a law that completely violates the constitution. The state is responsible for establishing procedures to conduct federal elections. However, the state isn’t allowed to recreate the constitutional guidelines in the process.
From Judicial Watch:
None of the interests proffered by the California legislature for requiring the disclosure of candidates’ tax returns is related to election procedure or administration. Rather, the stated interests incorporate particular, substantive judgments about what is most important for voters to know when considering a candidate, how voters should go about “estimate[ing] the risk” of a candidate “engaging in corruption,” and what might assist law enforcement in detecting violations of the Emoluments Clause and crimes “such as insider trading.”
Unless SB 27 is enjoined, states will assume the power to create their own qualifications for national candidates seeking to obtain a party’s nomination for president. This could lead to as many as 50 distinct and possibly inconsistent sets of qualifications regarding the only national election in the United States. Using rationales similar to California’s, states might come to demand medical records, mental health records, sealed juvenile records, driving records, results of intelligence, aptitude, or personality tests, college applications, Amazon purchases, Google search histories, browsing histories, or Facebook friends.
Judicial Watch President Tom Fittion weighed in on the situation.
“California politicians, in their zeal to attack President Trump, passed a law that not also unconstitutionally victimizes California voters. It is an obvious legal issue that a state can’t amend the U.S. Constitution by adding qualifications in order to run for president. The courts can’t stop this abusive law fast enough.”
Predictable Ending
I hate to state the obvious, but I can already tell you how this will turn out. The court has no choice but to declare the law unconstitutional. Liberals will cry when they get the news. Then, they will grasp at straws, seeking some other way to rid themselves of Trump. Clearly, Californians see the writing on the wall. If Trump is on the ballot, Trump takes the victory. There’s no way around it.
