Left-wing efforts to disqualify some Republican members of Congress from seeking reelection on the basis that they engaged in insurrection related to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack suffered another blow on Friday with Georgia officials finding that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) is in the clear to seek a second term.
Five voters in Greene’s district, working with liberal activists and scholars, challenged her candidacy by arguing that she engaged in an insurrection with her rhetoric in the lead-up to the Capitol riot. On the witness stand in April, Greene repeatedly said she did not recall making such comments, that she called for a peaceful demonstration and that she was unaware of plans for violence.
The Friday decision rejecting the Georgia voters’ challenge is the latest in a string of efforts to disqualify candidates over ties to the Jan. 6 riot that have fallen flat.
A judge in March blocked a challenge to Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s (R-N.C.) candidacy on similar grounds, after challengers argued that his involvement with former President Trump’s “Stop the Steal” Ellipse rally on Jan. 6 made him ineligible for office.
Voting rights nonprofit Free Speech for People, which is behind both the Greene and Cawthorn challenges, also tried to keep Reps. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) and Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) off the ballot based on Jan. 6. A Maricopa County Superior Court judge dismissed those complaints last month, saying that plaintiffs did not have the legal authority to challenge their candidacies.
The disqualification clause in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, adopted after the Civil War, says that those who previously took an oath to the Constitution and then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” may not hold office.
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