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Confirmed
In Short: The Supreme Court has blocked President Trump's plan to restrict voting by mail, ruling it is too late to impose new postal service rules for the November election.
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court has blocked President Trump's plan to restrict voting by mail, ruling it is too late to impose new postal service rules for the November election. The justices left in place a judge’s order that prevents the U.S. Postal Service from implementing new rules.
The Supreme Court's decision came after it twice last week ruled against Republicans by declining to revive a new congressional map in Missouri that would have eliminated one of two Democratic-held districts.
Election law experts noted that the conservative majority on the court follows its own agenda, not Trump’s, and has delivered him major defeats this year on his sweeping tariffs and plan to roll back birthright citizenship.
The court's actions suggest it will not be receptive to last-minute efforts to change election rules heading into the midterms, signaling a potential shift in how the court views election-related issues.
What's confirmed
- WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court has blocked President Trump's plan to restrict voting by mail, ruling it is too late to impose new postal service rules for the November election. The justices left in place a judge’s order that prevents the U.S. Postal Service from implementing new rules.
- The Supreme Court's decision came after it twice last week ruled against Republicans by declining to revive a new congressional map in Missouri that would have eliminated one of two Democratic-held districts.
- Election law experts noted that the conservative majority on the court follows its own agenda, not Trump’s, and has delivered him major defeats this year on his sweeping tariffs and plan to roll back birthright citizenship.
- The court's actions suggest it will not be receptive to last-minute efforts to change election rules heading into the midterms, signaling a potential shift in how the court views election-related issues.
What's still developing
- A federal judge has already halted the plan nationwide, but the Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to revive it, arguing the federal government would be seriously harmed by voter fraud if it does not.
- “Compliance with the USPS’ rule would be impossible ahead of the midterms, meaning that millions of voters would be unable to vote by mail and some would not be able to vote at all,” the state attorneys general told the court last week.
- She found the Trump administration had presented no evidence to the court of widespread fraud, while the states had presented ample evidence that implementing such a system on such a fast timeline posed tremendous risk.
- With control of Congress at stake, the court on Monday night blocked Trump’s plan to exert federal control over mail-in ballots via a Postal Service regulation.
- While the court has a 6-3 conservative majority that often rules for Republican priorities, there are limits to how receptive some justices are to more extreme requests, election law experts told NBC News.
- “I think the court is going to pay very close attention to any extraordinary actions that destabilize the electoral process,” said Bob Bauer, who served as White House counsel under President Barack Obama.
- In the aftermath, the court quickly allowed Republican states to draw new congressional maps that eliminated majority-Black, Democratic-held seats.
- “In both instances, the court said we’re not going to countenance that,” said Travis Crum, an NBC News contributor and law professor at Washington University in St. Louis.