Supreme Court Rules Mail-In Ballots Can Be Counted After Election Day
The Supreme Court ruled Monday that federal law allows states to count non-military mail-in ballots received after Election Day.
The Supreme Court ruled Monday that federal law allows states to count non-military mail-in ballots received after Election Day.
In a 5-4 ruling written by Trump-appointed Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the Court held that “federal election-day statutes” do not “preempt” Mississippi’s law allowing mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day to count if received up to five days later. Barrett was joined by the Court’s three liberals as well as Chief Justice John Roberts.
“As we have said before, the federal election-day statutes ‘simply regulate the time of the election,'” Barrett wrote in the Court’s opinion. “By setting the day for the ‘election,’ these statutes set the day when the electorate must make its choice. It is a ‘fundamental canon of statutory construction that words generally should be interpreted as taking their ordinary meaning at the time Congress enacted the statute.'”
“The election-day statutes say nothing about ballot receipt, and we cannot add to the words Congress chose,” Barrett’s opinion concluded.
In his dissenting opinion, Justice Samuel Alito wrote that the court’s decision “is inconsistent with the terms of the election-day statutes, contemporary election-law principles, two centuries of historical practice, and the case law on the question presented.”
“It opens up and fails to resolve a host of questions for state election officials and courts,” he added. “And it creates a serious risk of further undermining public confidence in our Elections and our system of self-government.”
Mississippi and 13 other states currently allow