The effort to disqualify candidates from office on the basis of the 14th Amendment is emerging as a broader strategy to run Republicans out of the midterms as Democratic control of the House hangs by a thread.  

The group spearheading those efforts — Free Speech for People, led by legal director Ronald Fein — has filed paperwork in Arizona to bar Representatives Paul Gosar and Andre Biggs, as well as a candidate for secretary of state, Mark Finchem, from running in upcoming elections. 

These challenges join ones already under way against Representatives Madison Cawthorn and Marjorie Taylor Greene. While Mr. Cawthorne has thus far fended off efforts to strike him from the ballot in North Carolina, the litigious escalation suggests a broader effort to use courts to set the electoral terms of engagement ahead of the November midterm elections.    

A federal appellate court gave Free Speech a minor victory by agreeing to fast-track consideration of the organization’s appeal, setting arguments before the riders of the Fourth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals for May 3. The legal director, Mr. Fein, tells the Sun that his group’s earlier setback was the result of a lower court decision that he characterized as “bizarre.”  

Another federal judge, Amy Totenberg, appointed by President Obama, will weigh the case against Ms. Greene today and decide on her request to dismiss the challenge. If Judge Totenberg refrains from intervening, the Georgia representative will appear before an administrative judge on Wednesday. 

As part of that process, Mr. Fein tells the Sun that he “looks forward to questioning Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene under oath about her involvement in the January 6th insurrection.” Free Speech has said that they believe Ms. Greene “helped facilitate the insurrection, before, during, and after January 6, 2021.” 

This flurry of litigation illuminates a larger strategy to widen the disqualification net to ensnare even more Republican candidates that extends to a senator as well. Senator Johnson of Wisconsin, in addition to Representatives Thomas Tiffany and Scott Fitzgerald, will have to fend off constitutional efforts to block them mounted by a Badger State super PAC.      

As the Sun has reported, Free Speech is on record as having a list of disqualification targets that could stretch to double digits, suggesting that this batch of legal challenges is not  exhausted. The expanding roster of contested candidates has prompted Mr. Cawthorn’s observation that blocking President Trump from running for office in 2024 is one possible endgame.  

Underpinning this campaign is a determination to canonize the events of January 6 as an “insurrection,” a word that appears, but is not defined, in the Constitution. It has been deployed by President Biden and other administration officials. 

It now could increasingly be up to courts to weigh in on whether what happened that day at the Capitol was indeed an insurrection, and whether the long reach of the Disqualification Clause could shape an electoral contest just coming into focus.