A separate section of the Constitution bans federal office holders who "engaged in insurrection or rebellion.” It was a condition added after the Civil War, but using it to keep today’s candidates off the ballot is a long shot.
Some state laws and constitutions bar felons from running for office, but that’s for state or local offices only.
When Arkansas tried to enact term limits on federal offices in 1992, for example, the measure was struck down by the courts.
Arkansas voters had adopted a state constitutional amendment that banned U.S. House or Senate members who had served a certain number of terms from running for re-election. The amendment was challenged, and in 1995 the U.S. Supreme Court held in U.S. Term Limits v. Thornton that states could not add qualifications for congressional candidates. The qualifications enumerated in the Constitution are exclusive, said Derek Muller, a University of Iowa law professor and expert on election law.
"There is general agreement that this extends to presidential candidates, too," Muller said. "That means a state cannot prohibit indicted or convicted felons from running for president."
The rationale behind this is to prevent states from driving presidential selection by imposing additional qualifications that would become, potentially, a patchwork few candidates could meet or could be manipulated to enable some states to collude to disqualify candidates, said Rebecca Green, a William and Mary election law professor.
"As to the question of why the Constitution does not prohibit those with criminal convictions running for president, part of the rationale may have been to prevent states from criminalizing certain activities as a means of gaming eligibility," Green said.
I’m pretty positive that WI, PA, and WI, not more, will at least try it. I suppose we could see a USSC intervention like in 2000, but even that would be such a mess.