A federal judge on Wednesday lifted a major obstacle to President Donald Trump’s executive order limiting mail voting, even as Democratic state officials filed a new court challenge with the midterm elections fast approaching.
The fresh round of legal wrangling comes just two days after the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a procedural ruling in Trump's favor and could mean the issue lands before the high court again before the pivotal contests for control of Congress. The first mailed ballots are set to be sent out next week.
U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston agreed to lift an order prohibiting the U.S. Postal Service from carrying out Trump’s order for November’s elections. She wrote that she was “compelled” to do so after the Supreme Court’s conservative majority ruled that a similar injunction she granted in a separate case was premature.
Talwani nevertheless said the executive order could unleash “chaos” and referred to it as “likely unconstitutional.”
The administration can now move forward and implement a Postal Service rule published late Friday. It would require states to follow a uniform envelope style for mail ballots and to give the Postal Service a list of voters eligible to receive them.
A new chapter in high-stakes litigation
The new lawsuit, filed by about two dozen Democratically controlled states against the U.S. Postal Service, marked a new phase in the high-stakes litigation.
It came after the Supreme Court ruled against them in a separate case, but did not say Trump’s order was legal.
The high court majority found the initial Democratic lawsuit was premature, but that was before the Republican administration issued a rule governing Postal Service delivery of mail ballots.
Election officials warn it will be impossible to implement before the first wave of mail ballots are sent out next week.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, one of 25 Democratic attorneys general filing the lawsuit, Mayes said more than three-fourths of Arizona voters have chosen to cast a ballot by mail in recent elections.
“This effort by the United States Postal Service and the federal government right now is a naked attempt to inject chaos and doubt into our election system right before voting starts, and it could harm the millions of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents who choose voting by mail as they exercise their constitutional right to vote,” Mayes said. “States run our elections, period; not the Postal Service and not the president.”
The Trump administration plan faces a third lawsuit originally filed in May in the nation's capital, though courts there have so far declined to block it.
All previous challenges were filed before the administration published its mail ballot rule Friday night.
White House spokesperson Lauren Bis on Wednesday said that the Postal Service’s proposals were “commonsense measures that protect the security of mail-in ballots” and that the administration would continue to work to implement them to boost “the safety and security of our elections.”
The Postal Service said it would not comment because of the pending lawsuit.
National Democrats on Tuesday cited the rule in asking the federal judge in the Washington case to block Trump’s order after he declined to do so last spring, saying the administration at the time had not taken concrete action.
Mayes, the Arizona attorney general, said early election officials in the state’s 15 counties are already preparing ballots for early voting, which starts in just over one month.
She said the new rules would require them to redesign envelopes and share voter data with postal officials, who would then “have to somehow determine who gets a mail-in ballot.”
“I mean, first of all, that's insane,” Mayes said. “It's unconstitutional, and it is completely physically impossible to do.”
In Boston, Talwani also found that the administration had violated a separate injunction she had placed on the Postal Service in drafting the new rule, although she did not take any action against the government. The League of Women Voters originally filed that lawsuit, and on Wednesday they also asked for a new court order blocking the mail voting plan.
Voting by mail has long been on Trump's radar
Trump has long targeted mail voting, which he falsely blames for his 2020 election loss and is disproportionately used by Democrats as a result of Trump’s condemnations. Since returning to power, Trump has tried to claim authority over election rules, saying he thinks Republicans should “take over” vote counting in Democratic areas.
He issued his first election executive order just months after retaking office, attempting to require documentary proof of citizenship to vote, among other changes. He has also been pushing a sweeping election bill that has stalled in the Senate amid opposition from Democrats and even some within his own party.
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Find everything you need to know about elections in Arizona and Maricopa County from KJZZ's politics team. -
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