Wyoming’s only U.S. House representative on Wednesday blasted a retired Laramie attorney’s legal challenge to keep former President Donald Trump and U.S. Sen. Cynthia Lummis of the state’s ballot.
Rep. Harriet Hageman, R-Wyoming, called Tim Newcomb’s pro se filing in Albany County District Court “boneheaded” and “tyrannical.”
Newcomb countered, accusing Hageman of having not read the filing, or the U.S. Constitution.
‘Unconstitutional Idiocy’
Hageman’s Wednesday statement criticizes Newcomb’s Nov. 1 filing, in which he argues that Lummis and Trump are unfit for office under the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, Section 3, which restricts public servitude for people involved in insurrections.
“These boneheaded attempts to keep President Trump off the ballot have sadly made their way to my state of Wyoming,” said Hageman. “The qualifications to run for president and senator are spelled out quite clearly in our founding document, and it doesn’t say anything about retired lawyers from Laramie having a say in the matter at all.”
Hageman said the “unconstitutional idiocy” of the lawsuit is compounded by its attempt to block Lummis from reelection, when Lummis isn’t up for reelection until 2026.
“This is truly top-notch legal work,” says the statement, adding, “All joking aside, this is an attempt to use the court system to interfere with an upcoming election and deny voters the chance to support a candidate of their choosing. Nothing could be more tyrannical than that.”
Legal scholars nationwide have been sparring for weeks over whether the 14th Amendment can be used to keep Trump off election ballots. Similar legal challenges in Florida and Michigan have failed so far, but attorneys general and plaintiffs in other states are still contemplating the question.
Timeless
Newcomb countered, noting that his filing doesn’t say the ballot removals need to happen in the 2024 election. When he initially penned it, he specified the 2024 election cycle, but in adding Lummis he scrubbed references to specific election years from the complaint, Newcomb told Cowboy State Daily on Wednesday.
“Having read and studied Ms. Hageman’s response, I would recommend her to footnotes 178, 187 and 193 of the document that she has not read — as she has obviously not read the Constitution,” said Newcomb.
Footnote 178 is a link to a YouTube video of a “Monty Python” scene in which a pet store salesman tells a customer with a dead parrot that the customer’s new parrot is merely asleep, not dead, while the customer struggles bombastically to prove that it’s dead, while weathering other lies from the shopkeeper.
Footnote 187 links to CNN’s coverage of former Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien, saying Trump’s maneuvers were not “honest or professional.”
Footnote 193 links to another YouTube video, specifically the 24-second mark of a “Weekend at Bernie’s” trailer, where the narrator says, “This is a place to die for.”
Newcomb said an “aggrieved Wyoming voter” has the right to ask for a court hearing on the issue.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
