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A federal judge late Sunday ordered that the U.S. Postal Service not implement President Donald Trump’s executive order limiting mail balloting, adding another obstacle to the administration’s effort to rewrite election rules as the Supreme Court is poised to weigh in on the matter.
The nation’s highest court already is considering the administration’s appeal of an order by U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani in Boston prohibiting the Postal Service from enforcing its new rule on mail voting before this year’s midterm elections.
Late Sunday, U.S. District Judge Carl J. Nichols in Washington, D.C., handed down a similar hold on the rule, which was issued Aug. 21.
“Plaintiffs have demonstrated that, absent an injunction, there is an increased risk that a significant number of otherwise appropriate absentee or mail-in ballots will ultimately not be counted in the upcoming elections,” Nichols wrote in issuing the preliminary injunction. “The public has a strong interest in ensuring that doesn’t happen.”
Nichols in May had refused to issue an injunction because he ruled the lawsuit seeking one was brought too early. That was the high court’s reasoning late last month when it lifted an earlier freeze by Talwani. But because the administration had just issued its rule to move ahead with Trump’s plan, the plaintiffs in Boston and Washington, D.C., refiled their lawsuits.
Talwani was nominated by former President Barack Obama and Nichols was nominated by Trump.
The new Postal Service regulations stem from an executive order Trump issued earlier this year. Election officials say it would be impossible to implement the changes this close to a general election.
The regulations would require all ballot envelope designs to be pre-approved by the Postal Service and that states upload the identities of those who are to receive them into a still-inactive online portal. Mail ballots already are being sent out in at least three states — Alabama, North Carolina and Wisconsin — and more states are preparing to distribute mail ballots this week.
A whistleblower report to Congress warned that millions of people would be disenfranchised if the rule was allowed to take effect for the midterms. The union representing U.S. Postal Service workers has pushed back against the executive order, saying it is not the job of postal workers to verify voter eligibility.
Mail balloting has long been a favorite target for Trump, who has falsely blamed it for his 2020 loss to Democrat Joe Biden and claimed it is a pathway to fraud despite his own use of the voting method.
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