It’s extremely difficult to square this ruling with the text of Section 3 [of the Fourteenth Amendment]. The language is clearly mandatory. The first words are “No person shall be” a member of Congress or a state or federal officer if that person has engaged in insurrection or rebellion or provided aid or comfort to the enemies of the Constitution. The Section then says, “But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each house, remove such disability.”
In other words, the Constitution imposes the disability, and only a supermajority of Congress can remove it. But under the Supreme Court’s reasoning, the meaning is inverted: The Constitution merely allows Congress to impose the disability, and if Congress chooses not to enact legislation enforcing the section, then the disability does not exist. The Supreme Court has effectively replaced a very high bar for allowing insurrectionists into federal office — a supermajority vote by Congress — with the lowest bar imaginable: congressional inaction.
This is a fairly easy read for the legal layperson, and the best general overview I've seen yet that sets forth the various legal and constitutional factors involved in today's decision, including the concurring dissent by Justices Kagan, Sotomayor, and Jackson.
It's like the Supreme Court thinks it can supersede the constitution because it thinks the ammendment was poorly worded/thought out. cough cough second ammendment cough cough
It's been a shit show since day one with this court. If there's ever been a time to pack the court it is now. Hell, do it in response to this ruling. Allowing an insurrectionist on the ballot is plain unacceptable. We're already heading toward discourse we cannot solve. Make a stand, would someone?
Edit: Just clarifying it's the Supreme Court who doesn't think it has to adhere to the language in the amendment. Not myself.