Couy Griffin (photo below) was an elected county commissioner in New Mexico until he was kicked out by a state judge. That happened on Tuesday, September 6, 2022 (read story here).
Griffin is a crank, an election denier, and founder of Cowboys for Trump. A judge can’t remove an elected official for those reasons, and shouldn’t be able to.
He was charged with entering the U.S. Capitol grounds on Jan. 6, 2021, but didn’t go inside. As NBC News reported (here), “Griffin is one of the few riot defendants who wasn’t accused of entering the Capitol building or engaging in any violent or destructive behavior.” But prosecutors regarded him as a provocateur; read the details here.
A federal judge found him guilty “of illegally entering restricted U.S. Capitol grounds but acquitted him of engaging in disorderly conduct” (see story here). That’s only a misdemeanor. The judge fined him $3,000 and sentenced him to 14 days in jail, 1 year of supervised release, and community service (see story here), which is significantly stiffer than the trespassing sentences meted out to many of the rioters.
Back home in New Mexico, after a recall attempt failed (see story here), an activist group sued for his removal. Similar lawsuits have failed elsewhere, but this group kicked the ball into the net. A state judge invoked the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment “insurrection clause,” last used in 1919, to remove Griffin and impose a lifetime ban from holding public office.
The judge’s ruling says, “Due to his disqualification under Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, defendant is constitutionally ineligible and barred for life from serving as a ‘Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President,’ or from ‘hold[ing] any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State,’ including his current office as an Otero County Commissioner.”
Here’s what Amendment 14, §3 says:
“No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”
Crucial to the judge’s determination is his conclusion that the Capitol riot was an “insurrection.” He isn’t the first judge to characterize the Capitol riot in this manner; as early as Jan. 15, 2021, a federal judge said Jacob Chansley, the infamous “shaman,” participated in a “violent insurrection” (see story here). But this is the first ruling that the Capitol riot satisfies the 14th Amendment definition.
Judges should be cautious about overriding voter choices for public offices, although keep in mind he only disqualified Griffin, and didn’t name his successor. Judges can disqualify candidates for not meeting residency or other eligibility requirements, and decide various kinds of election disputes, so they do have a role to play in the selection of public officials.
We’ll have to see if Griffin appeals, and what happens if he does. But I’ll say this: He along with the other 15,000 people in that mob attacked the rights of 81 million Americans by trying to overthrow the election, and should be held accountable in order to defend our rights, the same as when any other crime is committed.
The big question hanging over all of this, of course, is whether Trump will also be held accountable. Some people may look at Griffin’s case as a precedent for barring Trump from holding public office again, but I don’t think so. (The New York Times agrees, see story here.)
Trump is a big fish who got 74 million votes; Griffin is a little fish who got 3,090 votes (details here). But Trump is guiltier than Griffin, and did much more to overthrow the election. If you ask me, the rules for big fish and little fish should be the same. Griffin and a host of other Capitol rioters probably will argue that, too, if Trump gets off and they don’t.
