North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn has sued to block efforts by voters seeking to prevent him from running for Congress this year because of his involvement in the January 2021 rally that preceded the U.S. Capitol riot.
The Republican s lawsuit, filed in federal court, says the state's candidate challenge process violates his constitutional rights and should be overturned. His lawyers also cite as nonapplicable a post-Civil War amendment to the Constitution that prohibits members of Congress who have engaged in an insurrection to continue serving.
The voters’ protest, initiated last month with the help of a national election and campaign finance reform group, is likely to be the first of similar candidate challenges in other states against members of Congress associated with the insurrection. The 14th Amendment says, in part, that no one can serve in Congress “who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress ... to support the Constitution of the United States shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same.”
