Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., told reporters last week that if the House select committee on the Jan. 6 Capitol riot found former President Trump to be culpable, then a constitutional provision may legally prevent him from seeking office again, the Washington Examiner reported on Monday.
The provision invoked by Raskin, a panel member of the Jan. 6 committee, is found in the 14th Amendment and prevents those who "engaged in insurrection or rebellion" from holding office.
The Maryland congressman dismissed concerns that Trump had already been acquitted of impeachment charges for "incitement of insurrection" in February, citing a "lack of precedent" regarding if the amendment is "self-executing" without requiring a previous conviction.
"There's also another view out there that, for example, Donald Trump has already been determined to have participated in insurrection and rebellion by virtue of his impeachment by the House by majority vote, and then the determination by 57 senators that he incited violent insurrection against the union," said Raskin, who was a House impeachment manager.
Harvard Law professor Laurence Tribe endorsed the idea that the provision was not self-executing on Twitter in October of last year.
"Even if Section 3 of the 14th Amendment isn't self-executing against the former president, it is certainly a strong basis for a vote of expulsion from the House for those members who aided and abetted the insurrection," Tribe said.
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