Sept. 14 (Reuters) — The Supreme Court of the United States declined on Monday to permit the United States Postal Service (USPS) to implement a rule aimed at mail-in voting, marking a setback for President Donald Trump’s efforts to curb voting by mail ahead of the November midterm elections, which will determine control of Congress.
The judges denied the Justice Department’s request to overturn a decision by federal Judge Indira Talwani of Boston, which barred the Postal Service from applying the measure while lawsuits filed by states and voting-rights groups were ongoing. The agency had adopted the measure after Trump signed, in March, an executive order aimed at tightening the rules governing mail-in voting.
Justice Samuel Alito, joined by fellow conservative Clarence Thomas, dissented from Monday’s decision, writing that the Trump administration “will likely prevail based on the merits of its appeal.”
Trump’s Republican peers are embroiled in a heated battle to maintain control of Congress in the midterm elections. Restricting mail-in voting would benefit the Republicans, as Democratic voters rely more on mail-in voting, according to several polls.
Another federal judge, District Judge Carl Nichols of Washington, D.C., also spoke out against the new rule on Sunday.
Under the new rule, states must provide USPS with lists of recipients of mail-in ballots and use mailing and return envelopes approved by the agency, equipped with unique barcodes. The Postal Service could then refuse to send ballots that do not comply with the new standards or that are associated with voters not listed.
Critics said the plan could disrupt the delivery of thousands of legitimate ballots as the November 3 vote approaches and cause chaos, given the imminent plans of many states to mail ballots to eligible voters. The administration said the new rule would prevent electoral fraud, though evidence of such fraud is rare.
Trump signed his executive order targeting mail-in ballots after years of questioning their security, although he himself frequently votes by mail. Trump has made false claims of widespread election fraud in U.S. elections, including his 2020 defeat to former Democratic President Joe Biden.
In an emergency filing on Sept. 6, the government urged the Supreme Court to allow it to implement an “important federal policy to protect the mail against use to commit electoral fraud.”
A coalition of states — the majority of which are Democratic-led — and the District of Columbia, as well as several voting-rights groups, challenged the USPS’s new rule.
Talwani issued a preliminary injunction on Sept. 4 blocking the rule, finding that it would likely violate the U.S. Constitution, which assigns election administration to the states. Talwani also stated that it would be impossible for states to comply with the rule, given the proximity of the midterm elections.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, based in Boston, refused last Thursday to stay Talwani’s order. The First Circuit said the rule “would likely result in the deprivation of the right to vote for millions of voters nationwide, while providing little—if any—benefit in curbing election fraud.”
Nichols granted a request by the Democratic Party and groups, including the NAACP, for a preliminary injunction blocking the rule. Nichols wrote that the rule could make it more difficult for some people to vote by mail and that it exceeded the Postal Service’s authority.
“No law grants the Postal Service the power to issue essential parts of the rule,” Nichols wrote.
All 50 states allow some form of mail-in voting. Of these, 29 states allow voters to request mail-in ballots without needing to provide a reason, and eight conduct their elections entirely by mail.
The fight over mail-in voting is part of a broader push by the Trump administration to expand federal involvement in the electoral process ahead of the midterm elections. On Aug. 24, the Supreme Court overturned an earlier injunction issued by Talwani in June that blocked Trump’s decree, including the USPS rule, before it had been finalized.
