Micheal Baca has become the thirdColorado presidential elector Secretary of State Wayne Williams alleging Williams violated their constitutional rights by making threats and removing Baca as an elector ahead .
“Our objective is to affirm a constitutional principle,” Baca, after voting for Ohio Gov. John Kasich instead of Hillary Clinton, said in a statement. “That principle is critical to our Framers’ design for electing the president. It is critically important that the courts clarify the rights of electors, so that the uncertainty that surrounded the 2016 vote does not repeat itself in the future.”
The lawsuit was announced in August by , an advocacy group founded by Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig, and filedon behalf of two Democratic electors, Polly Baca (unrelated to Micheal) and Robert Nemanich.
The electors in the lawsuit have argued thatthe U.S. Constitution gives presidential electors the right to vote their conscience.
“The Constitution vests in electors the choice for whom they will vote,” Lessig said in a news release Wednesday announcing Baca has joinedthe lawsuit. “Subject to a single limitation specified by the Constitution, that discretion is reserved to them, and them alone. When Secretary Williams removed Micheal Baca as an elector because of his vote, Williams violated both Baca’s federal constitutional rights and a clear directive of the 10th Circuit (Court of Appeals). We will ask the federal courts to affirm the Constitution’s plan by declaring that the actions of Secretary Williams violated plaintiffs’ rights.”
Lessig andDenver lawyer Jason Wesoky are representing the electors in the case. They are seeking $1 in damages.
The lawsuit is the to Colorado’s electoral rules . Those rules require presidential electors to vote for the winner of the state’s popular vote. Clinton bested Trump in Colorado during last year’s election.
The Electoral College process took on new importance — and drama — after Trump’s victory because a group of Democratic electors had sought to band together with Republicans to deny Trump the 270 electoral votes he needed to become president.
but turned Colorado into an unlikely ground zero for a broader debate about the role of the Electoral College.
Polly Baca and Nemanich voted for Clinton, as the law requires. The Colorado Attorney General’s Office was forwarded Micheal Baca’s case for prosecution.
The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office has said the Equal Citizens lawsuit is without merit.