Mail-in voting remains popular as states await Supreme Court decision

Aug. 7 (UPI) — The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to make a decision on the Trump administration’s request to allow it to restrict mail-in voting soon.

The Justice Department requested that the high court make a decision by mid-August. It is asking the court to lift an injunction that is blocking President Donald Trump’s March executive order to further restrict mail-in voting.

The executive order requires that states share their voter rolls with the federal government and calls for the U.S. Postal Service to issue a rule that it will refuse mail-in ballots to people that do not meet the administration’s narrowed requirements.

Aaron Blacksberg, federal policy counsel with the Institute for Responsive Government, told UPI about the potential outcomes from the Supreme Court.

“If the Supreme Court, probably any day now, says that the current lower court ruling stands, there won’t be a rule at all this year,” Blacksberg said. “If the Supreme Court says that the Postal Service can continue issuing that final rule, there will still be more lawsuit action.”

Even without the Supreme Court allowing the Trump administration to place greater restrictions on mail-in voting, Blacksberg said the rhetoric and proposed rulemaking add to the confusion of voters.

“What we hear from elections administrators is just the announcement of proposals has an impact,” Blacksberg said. “It gets out there in the discourse and then folks don’t fully understand the ins and outs of an administrative procedure like a rule making or an executive order. As of right now, nothing has changed.”

Despite the president’s opposition to mail-in voting, it remains popular across the country regardless of the party they support, Molly McGrath, national director of democracy campaigns at the ACLU told UPI.

“The data tells us that mail-in voting is something that is enjoyed across the political spectrum,” McGrath said. “It’s the preferred method of some voters in city centers and some voters in rural areas. Mail-in voting is an essential option for many people with disabilities and older Americans.”

Among 32 states that share data on votes cast by mail, about one-third of voters used mail-in voting in the 2024 election. About two-thirds of voters either voted early or cast ballots by mail, the U.S. Census Bureau reported. A survey by Pew Research Center last year found that 58% of respondents were supportive of expanding access to mail-in voting.

“What the Constitution tells us is that no president can unilaterally write election laws, period,” McGrath said.

The Constitution stands as the foremost legal barrier impeding the president’s hopes of restricting mail-in voting. The Constitution grants states the authority to determine the time, manner and place of elections and gives Congress oversight and the authority to pre-empt state laws through legislation so long as that legislation does not infringe upon states’ rights.

Under the Constitution, the president does not have the authority to make changes to how elections are administered and has no direct role in election rules at all.

To curtail the Constitutional limits on presidential authority, Trump has sought to direct federal agencies to take actions that would restrict mail-in voting.

First, he is calling for the USPS rulemaking to refuse mail-in ballots to voters that do not meet his requirements. Second, he directs the Department of Homeland Security to screen all foreign nationals for voter eligibility and review the security of all election systems.

In June, Postmaster General David Steiner told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that the USPS would refuse to deliver ballots in states that refused to share their voter rolls with the Trump administration under a proposed regulation.

More than 30 states have refused to share voter rolls with the administration. The Trump administration has entered lawsuits against a number of these states and so far has not won any of those cases. Eight of the lawsuits have been dismissed.

The key safeguard to prevent the USPS from carrying out Trump’s order to refuse delivery of mail-in ballots is the Postal Service’s Universal Service Obligation. This mandate requires that the USPS provide mail services to all and ensures delivery to all addresses.

It also requires that the USPS deliver all types of mail unless Congress has p***ed a law prohibiting delivery of those items. Examples of items that Congress has prohibited include firearms, explosives, knives and smokeless tobacco.

The USPS does not have the authority to unilaterally change the rules regarding the mail it delivers and who it delivers to. In short, if eligible mail is submitted to the USPS, it is required to deliver it and in a reasonable fashion to the best of its ability.

“There are laws requiring the delivery of mail that individual people in the Postal Service can face criminal liability if they don’t do the right thing and follow the law,” Blacksberg said.

“The Postal Service has its own lawyers who can advise on their legal obligations but it’s not so simple that they could flip that on the drop of a dime and have everyone from letter carriers up through processing center employees who are the ones moving mail through the different stages of the process to stop doing what they’ve done.”

Barbara Smith Warner is a former state legislator in Oregon and serves as a senior adviser to the Institute for Responsive Government. Mail-in voting is a topic that she has advocated for throughout much of her career, she told UPI.

Smith Warner’s state is one of eight states that conducts universal vote-by-mail, meaning voters are automatically given mail-in ballots without needing to request them. Washington, D.C., also has universal vote-by-mail.

Smith Warner told UPI that she remains confident in the USPS despite Trump and the postmaster general’s push to limit mail-in voting.

“I have the highest praise for the Postal Service. They do their very best, broadly, organizationally, to maximize the safety and security and prompt delivery,” Smith Warner said. “I have great faith in the Postal Service and they’re being put into an untenable situation where they’re being asked to do things that they don’t have the capacity to do, they don’t have the experience of doing.”

Since the last general election in 2024, several states have reconsidered their vote-by-mail policies. Few have made changes to their policies.

“There have been a couple states that have talked about going from no excuse required back to excuse required and none of them have been successful,” Smith Warner said. “There have been a lot of conversations about it but honestly there have not been a lot of significant changes.”

Smith Warner and Blacksberg said the partisan divide atop the federal government over mail-in voting is a relatively new phenomenon with Republicans, led by Trump, railing against it.

Absentee voting records have long shown that Republican voters have often voted absentee more than Democratic voters. Republican lawmakers, particularly in the 1990s, pushed for broadening access to mail-in ballots by implementing no-excuse-required policies.

“A lot of voting by mail was pioneered in what were then heavily-Republican areas and used by more Republican voters,” Blacksberg said. “The partisan breakdown has changed a lot.”