Trump deserved to lose on all these points, and the Colorado Supreme Court correctly rejected his arguments on them. But I think he did have a plausible argument on the issue of whether his involvement in the Jan. 6 attack was extensive enough to qualify as “engaging” in insurrection. At the very least, he had a better argument there than on self-execution. The Court’s resolution of the latter issue is based on badly flawed reasoning and relies heavily on dubious policy arguments invoking the overblown danger of a “patchwork” of conflicting state resolutions of Section 3 issues. The Court’s venture into policy was also indefensibly one-sided, failing to consider the practical dangers of effectively neutering Section 3 with respect to candidates for federal office and holders of such positions.
Our elections are a patchwork by design. The requirements to get on the ballot are different for every state.