The Supreme Court has rejected an urgent request from former President Donald Trump to implement new U.S. Postal Service rules aimed at restricting mail-in ballots. The decision comes just weeks before the midterm elections, marking a significant setback for Trump's efforts to challenge voting procedures.
Trump's legal team had petitioned the Supreme Court to allow new USPS regulations that would enable the government to verify mail-in ballots against a central voter registry, with the power to reject ballots from individuals not listed in the database. This marks the third time the former president's administration has sought the high court's intervention on this matter.
Critics of the proposed rules argued that their last-minute implementation risked creating widespread confusion and could disenfranchise millions of Americans who rely on mail-in voting. Several states are already in the process of sending out mail-in ballots. North Carolina began distributing theirs on Friday, with six additional states set to follow suit by the end of next week.
Solicitor General John Sauer, representing Trump, had characterized a lower court's decision to block the order as "baseless" and warned that it would only lead to further voter confusion. However, opponents countered that the new rules would disproportionately affect voters who cast their ballots by mail, a group that constitutes roughly one-third of all U.S. voters.
Despite his public stance on mail-in voting, Trump himself utilized mail-in ballots during the Florida Republican primary last month.