President Donald Trump scored a win at the Supreme Court on Monday as it dismissed a block on his executive order to put new restrictions on mail-in voting. But it could be very short-lived.
As Georgetown Law professor Steve Vladeck explained in a lengthy analysis, the ruling doesn’t actually let Trump’s plan take effect immediately — and another ruling is likely to come down as soon as tomorrow morning that renders it moot.
Trump’s order directs the U.S. Postal Service to restrict delivery of mail ballots in states that don’t turn over a litany of information about their voter rolls to the federal government, which, if implemented this close to the election, could send state elections around the country into disarray and confusion.
For starters, wrote Vladeck, “there are two different cases at the forefront of challenges to the executive order, both pending before Judge [Indira] Talwani in the District of Massachusetts.” The two cases are California v. Trump, brought by a coalition of blue states, and League of Women Voters of Massachusetts v. Trump, brought by voting rights organizations.
“Critically, Judge Talwani has issued injunctions against the executive order in both cases. But Monday’s Supreme Court ruling applies only to one of them — the one brought by the states,” wrote Vladeck. Trump’s solicitor general “asked the Supreme Court to reach out and pour cold water on that injunction, too” — but, he continued, “I don’t see anything in the 10-page majority opinion that speaks to the validity of that injunction one way or the other.”
The other big thing to consider, said Vladeck, is that so far, all the legal challenges are to the executive order directing the Postal Service to issue a rule — not the rule itself. But that’s coming, and it could be coming in a matter of hours.
“The rule itself acknowledges the injunctions … and provides it won’t go into effect so long as those injunctions remain in force (as one of them still does),” wrote Vladeck. Moreover, “in the League of Women Voters case, Judge Talwani has already indicated that she is inclined to block that rule, too — for the same reasons she enjoined the executive order. That ruling may come as soon as tomorrow — which is when any opposition to such a ruling from the government is due at 8:00 a.m. ET.”
It’s the litigation over the final rule, Vladeck added, that is “going to be critical here.”
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