Washington— The Supreme Court on Friday declined to freeze a ruling by Pennsylvania’s highest court that required election officials to count provisional ballots cast by people whose ballots were invalid because they did not have the mandatory secret envelopes.
The judge’s order means election officials in key battleground states must count provisional ballots sent on Election Day by voters who returned ballots that were damaged, because they did not include a secret envelope or failed to mark or date the outer envelope. Justice Samuel Alito issued a statement on the court’s rejection of the emergency request from Republicans and was joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch.
It is unclear how many provisional ballots will be counted as a result of the Supreme Court’s order. In many counties, voters are notified that their ballots may be disqualified and have the opportunity to request a new ballot or go to a polling place on Election Day to cast a provisional ballot.
Still, the presidential race in Pennsylvania has tied, and won the the country is the center for Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump’s efforts to secure electoral votes needed for victory.
Republicans, who are seeking relief from the Supreme Court, have warned that if the Pennsylvania court decision is upheld, “tens of thousands” of provisional votes could be counted in the state that could decide control of the Senate and the White House. He said that if the judge ruled that the state high court’s ruling was not warranted, he would have to order the provisional ballots at issue to be set aside and not included in the official vote count while the legal battle rages on.
In the 2020 election, about 1% of returned ballots were rejected because they did not have secretarial envelopes, according to an analysis from the MIT Election Data and Science Lab.
The Republican National Committee and the Pennsylvania GOP have seeking the intervention of the Supreme Court Monday, more than a week before Election Day. Millions of voters nationwide have cast ballots early, in person or by mail, including in Pennsylvania, where more than 1.5 million voters have returned ballots, according to the University of Florida’s Election Lab.
“This case is of great public importance, potentially affecting tens of thousands of votes in a state that many anticipate could be decisive for control of the US Senate or even the 2024 presidential election,” Republican lawyers told the Supreme Court in a filing. . “Whether an important election is to be conducted according to rules established by the General Assembly or according to the will of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is an important constitutional question which must be addressed directly in this court.”
The Pennsylvania case arose after the primary election in April, when two voters from Butler County mailed ballots but failed to put them in secret envelopes. The state also requires voters to sign and date the mailing envelopes containing the ballots. Failure to comply with these requirements renders the ballot invalid and ineligible for counting.
Because voters returned their ballots without secret envelopes, they were notified by election officials that their votes could not be counted and advised to cast provisional ballots on Election Day, which voters did.
But the county board of elections did not count the provisional ballots. After learning that their ballots were rejected, the voters challenged the decision in state court and argued that the board of elections had acted improperly. The trial court disagreed, finding that the state’s election code prohibits individuals who submit a “timely received” ballot from counting a provisional ballot, even if the ballot is damaged.
But voters won before the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, which ruled in a 4-3 decision that the Board of Elections must count provisional ballots cast by voters whose mail ballots were rejected due to the lack of secret envelopes.
While the dispute involved voters from Butler County, the Pennsylvania Department of State reaffirmed in guidance last week that provisional ballots can be issued when voters return completed ballots that will be rejected and voters believe they are eligible to vote.
Republicans asked the Supreme Court to suspend the ruling from Pennsylvania’s highest court, warning that if it stands, the county board “will be forced to ignore the clear mandate of the Election Code and count provisional ballots sent on Election Day by mailers broken voice.”
He also argued that the state Supreme Court erred in changing the rules on mail-in elections after they began and close to Election Day.
But attorneys for voters said Republicans sought to disrupt Pennsylvania’s election rules by asking the Supreme Court to block dozens of county election boards from counting provisional ballots and “regulate the new provisional ballot separation regime” less than a week earlier. Election Day.
They argued that since the Pennsylvania General Assembly expanded mail-in voting five years ago, most county Boards of Elections and state courts count provisional ballots cast by voters who send ballots that would be considered invalid.
Citing the RNC’s appeal to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which was later ruled by that court, voter advocates argued that the GOP is now “asking the federal courts to step in and change Pennsylvania’s election laws, as interpreted by the Supreme Court, a majority of the county board of elections, and the Pennsylvania Department of State.”
He said Republicans are asking the Supreme Court to “insert itself into state law to revive a legal regime that is less uniform and more burdensome for counties, more confusing to voters and candidates, and more unfair to all.”
The dispute over temporary ballots in Pennsylvania is one of the few related to the election that the Supreme Court has been asked to intervene in. On Tuesday, the high court rejected the bid by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., to be removed from the ballot in Michigan and Wisconsin, two states at war. The judges on Wednesday allowing Virginia to advance with a program that aims to remove non-citizens from its voter rolls.
