I’m sipping my coffee and reading about the latest Supreme Court decision, and folks, I almost spilled my coffee reading about this one. The Supreme Court has given President Donald Trump the green light to start implementing parts of his executive order that aims to restrict mail voting. But, bless their hearts, the court’s decision is limited, and additional legal challenges could still hinder the implementation of Trump’s plan before the November midterm election.
The court’s 10-page order allows the Trump administration to move forward with a proposal for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to compile state-specific lists of people it believes are eligible to vote in the Democratic-led states that had challenged the plan in court. However, the justices did not address the legality of Trump’s executive order, only the timing of the challenge to it. This means that more court action will likely be needed before the US Postal Service (USPS) can move forward with implementing the order.
Another part of Trump’s executive order instructs the USPS to impose new mandates on states that want to send ballots through the mail, requiring that they submit their own lists of eligible voters to the agency and include information on ballot envelopes to allow those ballots to be tracked. The justices gave the USPS the green light to implement that aspect of Trump’s plan, but a lower court blocked that effort nationwide in a separate case. That means more court action will likely be needed before the USPS can move forward.
The Supreme Court’s decision did not address the legality of Trump’s executive order, only the timing of the challenge to it. Trump for years has made baseless claims about widespread voter fraud while specifically attempting to undermine confidence in mail voting. The liberal justices dissented from the decision, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor writing that they believed lower courts had the authority to rule in favor of the Democratic states now, while stressing that the high court’s majority had not addressed the legality of Trump’s directives on the merits.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson penned her own lengthy dissent, using stronger language to bash how the ruling “needlessly injects chaos and uncertainty into the upcoming midterm elections.” She described what she saw as an inconsistent approach by the conservative majority when it comes to the timing of challenges to election policies, describing the precedents as a “Kafkaesque nightmare.”
The president’s order required states to submit lists of eligible voters to the USPS. The agency would be barred from delivering ballots mailed by states to people not on those lists. It also required states to use tracking barcodes on ballot envelopes. And it “prioritized” federal prosecution of state election officials who send or receive ballots to non-citizens or others ineligible to vote.
In conclusion, the Supreme Court’s decision is a win for Trump, but it’s not a clear victory. The order is still facing legal challenges, and it’s unclear whether it will be fully implemented before the midterm election. As Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said, “The ruling is a win for Trump for the moment, but it doesn’t fully clear the way for his effort to limit mail-in ballots to go into effect.” And I have to say, this whole thing is a bit of a mess, but hey, that’s just the way the cookie crumbles, right? 🥐
Armchair patriot. Believes in the free market, cold beer, and that there’s always a guy named George behind every CNN segment.
Former remote-throwing champion turned #1 couch commentator on liberal panic in the media. Born in Texas (or so his mug says), he earned a degree in Fake Newsology & Beer Philosophy from YouTube University.
