SCOTUS Opens Door to Mail-Voting Chaos

The Supreme Court allowed Trump's mail-voting order to proceed, but a separate nationwide.

The Supreme Court's conservative majority on Monday lifted a lower-court injunction that had blocked President Donald Trump's executive order restricting mail voting in 23 states and the District of Columbia. According to SCOTUSblog, the unsigned 10-page opinion found it was too early for the states to challenge the order because it had not yet been carried out, meaning the states had not suffered the kind of injury required to sue. The court's three Democratic appointees dissented, with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson accusing the majority of missing the government's actual objective to foment chaos ahead of the November elections.

The ruling does not immediately change how elections are run. AP News reports that a second injunction, issued by the same federal judge in Boston in a separate case, still bars the U.S. Postal Service nationwide from implementing one provision of the executive order. Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi noted that Postmaster General David Steiner has already pushed ahead with rules to carry out Trump's restrictions despite a federal judge expressly ordering him not to complete that rulemaking. Krishnamoorthi renewed his call for Steiner to resign or be removed by the Postal Service Board of Governors.

The compressed timeline is at the heart of officials' alarm. AP News reports that initial ballots are scheduled to be sent to North Carolina's overseas and military voters on September 4. Spectrum News, citing election officials, reports that Jesse Salinas, registrar of Yolo County in California, said ballots in his state start going out in 11 days and his county has already printed its envelopes. The new USPS rule requires specific envelope formatting and electronic voter identification systems, meaning some jurisdictions may need to completely revise their ballot materials.

Election administrators across the country say the timeline makes compliance unfeasible. According to Spectrum News, Tammy Patrick of the Elections Center said there is not a single state that runs elections the way the postal rule lays out. Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar, whose state sends every registered voter a mail ballot, expressed disbelief that the post office could build a database with complete accuracy within seven days. Vermont Secretary of State Sarah Copeland Hanzas told WCAX that the ruling does not change the status quo and that the USPS cannot move forward until all legal challenges are resolved.

State officials are preparing new lawsuits and assuring voters that procedures remain unchanged. According to the Arizona Capitol Times, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said nothing has changed for Arizona voters and that further obstacles remain before the Trump administration can implement new USPS rules. Oregon Secretary of State Tobias Read told KATU that Oregon will run the same safe and fair mail-in election it has long conducted. Arizona Attorney General Mayes characterized the Supreme Court ruling as procedural rather than substantive and vowed to continue challenging the USPS rule.

Legal scholars stress that the Supreme Court did not decide whether Trump's order is constitutional. CNN reports that the order came over the dissent of three liberal justices and does not resolve the legality of Trump's proposal. According to Spectrum News, UCLA law professor Rick Hasen said it is inconceivable the regulation will impact voters in November, while Notre Dame law professor Derek Muller said the ruling still ensures a fraught court battle in the coming days. The Supreme Court itself noted that future lawsuits may be more successful once the order's directives are actually implemented.