Colorado Republicans appeal against Donald Trump’s 2024 ballot ban

Colorado Republicans have appealed to the US Supreme Court after the state’s top court ruled that Donald Trump was ineligible to run for president.

The appeal means he will remain for now on the ballot for the Colorado primary.

Last week, the ex-president was disqualified from running in the state for his alleged role in the 6 January 2021 attack on the US Capitol.

Mr Trump is the Republican frontrunner and is expected to be the party’s candidate for the 2024 US election.

In its appeal, the Colorado Republican Party’s legal team accused the state Supreme Court of “fundamentally changing the course of American democracy,” according to the BBC’s US partner CBS News.

They added that the decision would “distort” the 2024 presidential election and would “mire courts henceforth in political controversies over nebulous accusations of insurrection”.

Colorado is the only US state to strike Mr Trump from the ballot under a US constitutional clause called the 14th Amendment prohibiting anyone engaging in “insurrection or rebellion” from holding public office.

This was the first time this provision has ever been used since it was introduced after the American Civil War.

Voting 4-3, the state’s top court found last week that the former president had incited an insurrection when the Capitol was stormed by his supporters. Mr Trump has repeatedly denied responsibility for the riot.

The ruling directed the Colorado secretary of state to exclude Mr Trump from the state’s Republican primary on 5 March. But it does not stop Mr Trump running in other states.

Similar lawsuits to to remove the Republican frontrunner from the ballot in Minnesota, New Hampshire and Michigan have failed.

It is unclear when the US Supreme Court will consider the case and make a decision. What it decides will probably apply nationwide.

Mr Trump’s team are also expected to appeal against the Colorado ruling.

The primary elections are the state-by-state search by each party for a presidential nominee.

Donald Trump’s campaign to win the Republican nomination will be complicated by a series of criminal trials in 2024 as he runs again for the White House.

He denies all the charges and says the justice system has been weaponised to stop him becoming president.