Supreme Court Makes Decision In Mail-In Ballot Fight Ahead Of Midterms

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday cleared the way for President Donald Trump to begin enforcing parts of an executive order aimed at restricting mail-in voting ahead of the midterm elections.

In an unsigned order, a majority of the justices agreed to pause a lower-court ruling by U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston that blocked the Trump administration from carrying out portions of a March executive. Monday’s order allows the Department of Homeland Security to move forward with creating lists of residents eligible to vote in 23 Democratic-led states.

Monday’s decision is an interim victory for Trump but does not resolve the order’s underlying legality, CNBC reported.

A majority of the court agreed with the Trump administration that Talwani, an Obama appointee, exceeded her authority by blocking the order’s implementation.

“The Court’s disposition of this application does not mean that any measure taken by the Government to implement the Order will necessarily be lawful. On that score, time will tell,” the court wrote. “But the Order itself does not harm the States, so the District Court lacked jurisdiction to bar the Government from trying to implement it.”

A separate injunction Talwani issued on Aug. 11 still bars the Postal Service from implementing the procedural changes ahead of the Nov. 3 elections, meaning the administration would also need to seek emergency relief to overcome that order.

In March, Trump signed an executive order directing the U.S. Postal Service to create a national voter list to help the agency determine who can receive a mail ballot. 

Last Friday, the USPS adopted new standards for mail-in ballots used in federal elections, requiring states to submit voter and ballot-tracking information through a new federal portal before ballots can enter the mailstream. Under the policy, states that do not comply could have their ballots rejected for delivery by the USPS.

Liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson blasted the court’s order.

“This is not a close call. The Government suffers no harm from an injunction limiting unlawful actions, much less ‘hypothetical’ and ‘speculative’ acts that the Government says it was not even sure it would take,” Jackson wrote.

This is a developing story. Stay with The Daily Wire for updates.