Setback for Trump as Maine strikes him off state ballot after Colorado

WASHINGTON: Former US President Donald Trump was struck off the primary ballot by another state Maine after Colorado thus pitching the 2024 election into "deeper chaos and a constitutional confusion" over "insurrectionist charges", reports said.

According to reports citing political analysts, just when Trump heaved a sigh of relief as Michigan court declined to be drawn into a constitutional battle and kept him on the states ballot, the Maine ruling comes as an "absolute rude shock" to the ex-President's campaign.

Risks of US electoral chaos deepen after Trump is barred from another state ballot, the headlines screamed in many newspapers across the US on Friday morning.

The state of Maine pitched the 2024 election into deeper chaos and constitutional confusion on Thursday by becoming the second state to throw Donald Trump off the ballot over the January 6, 2021, US Capitol riots.

Colorado courts had ruled Trump was unfit to be on the ballot for president for his alleged involvement in the January 6, 2021 incident that threatened to halt the announcement of the 2020 verdict electing Joe Biden as President.

The Colorado Supreme Court invoked the 14th amendment, introduced after the 1860 civil war, that no one involved in insurrection against the state could hold a future public office.

But the Michigan courts did not allow a similar suit to be filed preventing an even pre-trial hearing saying this was a matter not for the courts but the electorate to decide. But Maine has ignored the Michigan courts and literally upheld the Colorado verdict.

The move from the Maine secretary of state – following a similar decision from the Colorado Supreme Court earlier this month -- worsened a growing crisis for Trump's campaign and strengthened the rationale for the US Supreme Court to take up the issue, arising from the 14th Amendment's "insurrectionist ban".

According to political analysts, Maine's decision has deepened an unprecedented legal and political imbroglio surrounding the 2024 campaign, all stemming from Trump's refusal to accept defeat to US President Joe Biden challenging US transfer of power.