Supreme court justice Clarence Thomas must recuse himself from ruling on Donald Trump’s eligibility for the 2024 presidential election, a prominent Democrat said Sunday, warning that the leading Republican candidate is seeking to become a “political martyr” as he pursues a second presidency.

Maryland congressman Jamie Raskin was speaking ahead of the nation’s highest court stepping in to adjudicate recent state rulings in Maine and Colorado that struck the former president from the general election primaries under the US constitution’s 14th amendment insurrection clause.

Thomas, whose wife, Ginni, a hard right conservative, was a vocal proponent of Trump’s big lie that his 2020 defeat to Joe Biden was fraudulent, should stand down ahead of the supreme court hearing the case, Raskin argued. Trump’s legal challenges could begin as early as Tuesday.

Raskin led the push for Trump’s second impeachment following the deadly January 6 riot that the ex-president’s supporters staged at the US Capitol.