GOP effort to impeach official who removed Trump from Maine ballot voted down

The Democrat-controlled Maine Legislature voted down a Republican effort to impeach the state’s chief election official for kicking former President Trump off the ballot for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol attack. 

In an 80-60 party-line vote, the state House struck down the impeachment resolution going after Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows (D). She slammed the GOP effort last week as “political theater” while also promising to comply with any legal development connected to her historical decision to remove Trump from Maine’s March 5 primary. 

Bellows became the first secretary of state in history to remove a candidate running for president after referencing the U.S. Constitution’s insurrection clause. The decision was swiftly appealed by Trump’s team and is currently in Maine’s Superior Court. 

Maine’s GOP members slammed Bellows’s ruling as “election interference,” arguing that people feel “absolutely disenfranchised.” 

State Rep. James Thorne, a Republican representing Carmel, said Bellows’s decision “does nothing but further divide the political banner between the parties, and indeed the people of the state of Maine, according to The Associated Press. State Rep. Michael Soboleski, of Phillips, called it “election interference of the highest order.” 

“There has been no conviction in a court of law. She is not a judge. She is not a jury. And I believe that the people feel absolutely disenfranchised,” said state Rep. Katrina Smith, a Republican from Palermo.

Despite the outrage, Maine’s Republican impeachment effort was a long shot, considering both chambers are controlled by Democrats. 

Colorado is the only other state that removed Trump from the ballot. Its decision is currently under appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Maine could play a key role in the 2024 presidential election; it carries four electoral votes and is one of the two states to split them. Trump, the current GOP front-runner, won one of Maine’s electoral vote in both of his White House runs.