The Supreme Court will allow Rhode Island’s loosened mail-in voting requirements, which were passed to help mitigate the spread of the coronavirus.
The court declined to intervene on Thursday in a battle over whether state residents, who previously needed to sign mail-in ballots in front of two witnesses or a notary, would have to go through the process for November’s election. The justices noted in their unsigned order rebuffing the Republican National Committee, which asked them to step in, that GOP lawmakers had already agreed to the provisions during the primary.
The court wrote that unlike “similar cases where a state defends its own law, here the state election officials support the challenged decree, and no state official has expressed opposition. Under these circumstances, the applicants lack a cognizable interest in the state’s ability to enforce its duly enacted laws.”
The order also noted that Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch would have granted the application.
President Trump and many of his allies have sought to prevent mass mail-in voting, arguing that doing so would open the possibility for interference and fraud. The president also noted earlier Thursday that the Postal Service is not prepared to handle the number of ballots the country will likely cast via the mail system and the issue of funding the Postal Service is a source of contention amid economic relief talks.
