The US Supreme Court has opened a path for Trump’s mail voting restrictions ahead of the November midterms.
The court did not rule on whether Trump’s executive order is lawful.
Further legal challenges could still delay or block the administration’s plans.
The US Supreme Court has opened a path for the Trump administration to pursue restrictions on mail-in voting ahead of the November midterm elections, while leaving unresolved whether President Donald Trump’s executive order is lawful.
In an emergency ruling on Monday, the court’s conservative majority found that the Democratic-led states challenging Trump’s order did not have the legal right to bring the case. The justices did not rule on the legality of the order itself, leaving room for further court challenges that could delay or block its implementation as states prepare to send out ballots.
The ruling comes just weeks before voting preparations accelerate. North Carolina is scheduled to send ballots to overseas and military voters on September 4, with other states expected to follow within weeks. According to AP, the US Postal Service outlined last week how it would implement the order, but time is running short to impose major changes before ballots are sent.
The Supreme Court said its emergency ruling should not be understood as a finding that every measure taken by the administration to implement Trump’s order would be lawful.
“The Court’s disposition of this application does not mean that any measure taken by the Government to implement the Order will necessarily be lawful. On that score, time will tell,” the majority wrote in an unsigned order.
The three liberal-leaning justices publicly dissented. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote that the ruling “lets another shoe drop in the Kafkaesque nightmare that our precedents have been steadily creating for certain plaintiffs who seek to bring election-related challenges.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James called the decision a “painful setback” but said it would “not be the final word.”
“This is just the first inning of a very fast nine-inning game,” said Derek Muller, a law professor at Notre Dame University.
Trump order faces opposition from Democratic-led states
Trump’s executive order, signed in March, directs his administration to create lists of eligible voters and orders the US Postal Service to deliver mail ballots only to people on those lists. Requirements released on Friday would also prevent the Postal Service from sending mail ballots from states that do not comply with the order.
Mail voting has long been a favourite target for Trump, who has claimed that it breeds fraud despite strong evidence to the contrary and despite his own use of the voting method.
A Postal Service spokesperson did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment. The White House did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
Democratic officials in 23 states and the District of Columbia sued to block the order. They argued that the Constitution gives states and Congress the power to run elections and warned that Trump’s changes could lead to chaos and partisan abuse.
“The consequences of allowing such transformative changes to take effect so close to this fall’s elections would be extreme,” attorneys for the states wrote.
Dozens of state and local election officials also urged the justices to keep the order frozen while preparations for the elections were already under way.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said the order was aimed at making it “harder for Americans to vote” in the pivotal elections for control of Congress. He vowed that Democrats would “fight every attempt to hijack mail-in voting and rig the rules before voters have their say this November.”
Lower courts have issued conflicting rulings
A judge in Massachusetts blocked the plan for the midterm elections in those states, and an appeals court upheld her decision. She later granted a second order blocking it nationwide in a separate case, creating another stumbling block for the Trump administration.
The Justice Department appealed to the Supreme Court on procedural grounds in late July, arguing that the states sued too soon. Federal attorneys also pointed to another ruling out of Washington, where a judge allowed Trump’s order to proceed. An appeals court backed that decision while leaving room for future court action if the changes are implemented.
Federal attorneys argued that the Massachusetts order “blocks the government’s ability to finalize and implement the President’s proposed policies to promote election integrity for the upcoming federal elections in November.”
A dozen Republican-leaning states supported the federal government in their own appeal before the high court, saying states would have input on the final voter lists.
AP reported that Monday’s ruling leaves room for further litigation that could still freeze the federal government’s efforts to implement the order.
Mail voting has become more common
The Supreme Court has previously ruled against Trump-backed arguments on mail ballots. In a 5-4 decision, the justices found that states can count ballots that arrive after Election Day. That case was decided after full briefing and arguments rather than through the court’s emergency docket.
He has also repeatedly pressed for legislation requiring proof of citizenship to vote. Non-citizen voting has been shown to be exceedingly rare and is a felony that can be punishable by deportation.
Mail voting has become increasingly popular with voters of both parties, with about 30% of all ballots cast that way during the 2024 presidential election, according to federal data.
The process has also been found to be secure. A 2025 Brookings Institution study found about four cases of fraud for every 10 million mail ballots cast.
David Becker, a former Justice Department lawyer who co-wrote a book debunking Trump’s 2020 election lies, said the high court created “pure chaos leading up to the midterm elections, waiting weeks after an administration filing, and just days before mail ballots go out, to completely rewrite the rules.”
