A Democratic member of Congress and two law enforcement officers testified in Denver District Court on Monday about their experiences with the violent mob on Jan. 6, 2021, as a judge considers whether Donald Trump is constitutionally ineligible to seek the presidency again for his role in allegedly stoking the U.S. Capitol attack.

Four Republican and two unaffiliated voters in Colorado have asked Judge Sarah B. Wallace to bar the secretary of state from listing Trump on the 2024 presidential primary ballot, under the theory that he engaged in an insurrection to halt the counting of the 2020 Electoral College votes and to overturn President Joe Biden’s victory.

Under the 14th Amendment, such conduct could render Trump ineligible to hold office again.

“Trump incited a violent mob to attack our Capitol, to stop the peaceful transfer of power under our Constitution,” argued Eric Olson, an attorney for the petitioners who was Colorado’s solicitor general until recently. “That mob tried to hurt and kill our elected leaders. And we are here because Trump claims, after all that, he has the right to be president again.”

Olson laid out the findings Wallace would have to make to keep Trump off the ballot: that Trump took an oath covered by the 14th Amendment, that Jan. 6 was an insurrection, that Trump engaged in the insurrection, and that a state court can order Secretary of State Jena Griswold to exclude constitutionally ineligible candidates.

“We shouldn’t even be here,” countered Trump’s attorney, Republican former Secretary of State Scott Gessler. “There are millions of people in Colorado and across this country who are inspired by President Trump. … Who are the petitioners to prevent those people from not being able to vote” for him?

During the first day of the hearing, the petitioners focused on the events of the Capitol attack itself, illustrating the violence of the mob and the fuel that Trump’s statements provided.

“A lot of us in the cloakroom looked at each other in an ‘Oh god, what does this mean for us’ kind of feeling,” testified U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif.

Swalwell, appearing virtually, described how members of Congress gathered in the U.S. House of Representatives’ chamber on Jan. 6 to count the electoral votes. They saw on their phones and on nearby TVs that Trump was addressing his supporters on the White House’s Ellipse about marching to the Capitol, he said. 

He described then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democratic leadership being whisked away by security as the mob amassed outside the building. U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., helped those in the chamber with gas masks, which Swalwell had not previously realized were stored beneath the representatives’ seats. 

Swalwell also monitored Trump’s tweets, including one where he accused Vice President Mike Pence of not having “the courage to do what should have been done.” It was an apparent reference to Pence’s refusal to reject Biden’s electoral votes from key swing states while he presided over the count.

“We connected the president’s tweets to our own safety in the chamber and also the integrity of the proceedings that were taking place,” said Swalwell. “I interpreted it to mean the president believed the vice president was refusing to do something that would overturn the outcome.”

The petitioners also presented testimony from two law enforcement personnel who responded to the Capitol grounds: Daniel Hodges, a District of Columbia police officer, and Winston Pingeon, a former U.S. Capitol Police officer. Both men described being physically attacked by rioters and called “traitors” and “oath breakers.”

“I saw people carrying banners saying ‘Stop the steal,’ which, based on my understanding, means people believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen,” testified Hodges. “Which was confusing to me as I was not aware of any evidence this was the case.”

Wallace saw video evidence from the attack, as well as Trump’s televised statements and tweets. The petitioners attempted to show that only when Trump released a video hours later telling the rioters “you’re very special” but they should “go home” did the mob disperse. The implication was the mob acted at Trump’s direction and he could have stopped the assault sooner, had he wanted.

Gessler, representing Trump, maintained Trump’s speech prior to the Capitol attack did not qualify as incitement, and instead amounted to urging his supporters to protest peacefully for the unfounded notion that the presidential election was stolen.

“None of it ever called for insurrection. Did it call for political pressure? Yeah. Did it use a metaphor for ‘fight’ in the political context? Yes,” Gessler said. “This turns our American values on their head. It is fundamentally anti-First Amendment.”

Gessler also characterized the report of the congressional committee charged with investigating the Jan. 6 attack – which had members from both political parties and concluded Trump bore responsibility for trying to overthrow the election – as a “one-sided political document.”

“Just because I allow in the Jan. 6 report does not mean I agree with all the findings,” said Wallace in response to Gessler’s objection about using the report as evidence.

The judge further heard from the lawyers representing Griswold and the Colorado Republican Party, which has intervened in the case. The GOP defended its prerogative to select its own candidates for office, while the Colorado Attorney General’s Office said Griswold did not plan to offer evidence of her own about Trump’s eligibility.

Earlier in the day, Wallace denied Trump’s request to recuse herself from the case, based on a donation she made before taking the bench to a political group that likened the Jan. 6 attack to an “insurrection.”

The case is Anderson et al. v. Griswold.