Something I’m not sure is talked about enough that is a consequence of that decision is they also removed enforcement of the 14th from the judicial branch, for no reason. The question was narrow: “Can States do this?” The ruling was: “No, they can’t, only Congress.” A better ruling (barring, “yes they can”) would have been: “No, they can’t.” Which would leave room for a convicted insurrectionist to be barred by the courts by said conviction.
Based on the actual decision Trump could lose the insurrection trial in DC and still be President because the Supreme Court just removed their ability to say otherwise. For no reason other than to protect Trump as far as I can tell. They’re not so stupid they’d remove power on accident, not to mention the more liberal justices and Barrett point this problem out explicitly in their concurrence.
All of this is moot because none of these federal cases will be decided by the election. The SCOTUS taking up Trump’s obnoxious immunity argument instead of saying the appeals court got it right already guaranteed that.
Damage already done, as always. They lie because it works. They retract because that doesn’t.