Supreme Court upholds late-arriving mail ballot counting in majority of states

The Supreme Court declined to invalidate laws in more than half the states and Washington, D.C., that allow mailed ballots postmarked by Election Day to arrive and be counted in the days following the election.

Republicans mounted a legal challenge to these statutes, but the justices rejected their arguments without ruling on the underlying constitutional questions. The decision leaves intact the counting procedures that election officials in those jurisdictions currently follow.

Under the contested laws, election administrators count ballots that arrive after Election Day if the U.S. Postal Service postmark indicates the voter mailed them by Election Day itself. The practice affects election outcomes in states across the country and has become standard procedure in jurisdictions including Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Arizona.

Republican groups sought to overturn these provisions through federal court action. They argued the laws undermined election integrity and conflicted with federal election statutes. The Supreme Court's action prevented those challenges from proceeding.

Election officials in states with these laws have defended them as necessary accommodations for mail delivery delays beyond voters' control. They argued that discarding validly mailed ballots simply because postal delays prevented timely arrival would disenfranchise voters who followed instructions and submitted their ballots on time.

The Court's decision carries particular weight as mail voting has expanded significantly over the past decade. Millions of voters across the country now rely on absentee ballots as their primary voting method, making the treatment of late-arriving mail ballots a central concern in election administration.

The ruling means that state election officials can continue applying these counting procedures through the 2024 election cycle and beyond without facing federal court interference based on this particular legal theory.

Neither the Supreme Court nor other federal courts have yet determined whether these state laws are constitutional under Article II of the Constitution, which governs how states conduct elections. The Court's action today sidestepped those deeper questions and instead blocked the specific legal challenge before it.