A Mississippi statute that
permits ballots to be counted provided they are received within five business
days following election day is being challenged in the Watson v. Republican National Committee case.
Citing long-standing
precedent, Mississippi election officials contend that the moment a ballot is
mailed in the mail, a voter has cast their ballot on or before election day,
and that how it arrives at an election office after that is an administrative
matter.
“As a matter of plain
meaning, an ‘election’ is the conclusive choice of an officer. Voters make that
choice by casting – marking and submitting – their ballots by election day,”
argues the state of
Mississippi in its petition to the supreme court for review.
“The election
has then occurred, even if election officials do not receive all ballots by
that day.”
According to the National
Conference of State Legislatures, sixteen states, together with Washington, DC,
Guam, and Puerto Rico, permit a domestic voter’s mail-in ballot to be counted
if it is postmarked by the election and arrives within a specific window of
time following election day.
The US Court of Appeals for
the Fifth Circuit, one of the country’s most conservative circuits, overturned a Mississippi federal
judge’s decision to uphold the state’s legislation. According to the majority
of that court, it is against federal law to allow ballots to arrive after the
designated day for federal elections.
The Republican National
Committee cited the Fifth Circuit ruling in its answer to the Supreme Court
appeal filing, stating that it “distinguished between an individual
‘voter’s selection of a candidate’ and ‘the public’s election of the
candidate.” Only “when the final ballots are received and the
electorate, not the individual selector, has chosen” is an election
considered final.
In an alternate
correspondence- in ballot case, Bost v. Illinois, which contests Illinois’s
practice of counting ballots postmarked on election day but entered up to two
weeks later, judges are mooting who has the right to suit.
Also, the court is
considering a significant challenge to Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act,
which seems likely to circumscribe the reach of the major civil rights
legislation.
The practice of permitting
ballots to arrive beyond election day has drawn criticism from Republicans and
Donald Trump. This time, at least three countries have stopped permitting late-
arriving ballots, and the chairman’s administrative order from March tried to
correct the countries that continued the practice.
How could this decision impact overseas and military absentee
voting?
The Supreme Court decision on whether countries can count
correspondence-in ballots entered after Election Day could significantly impact
overseas and military absentee voting, which heavily relies on extended
deadlines to insure ballots transferred from abroad arrive on time.
Military labor force and overseas choosers bounce under the
Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA), which requires
countries to accept ballots postmarked by Election Day and entered within a
reasonable time subsequently, frequently five to ten days. These extended
deadlines fete the postal detainments essential in transferring ballots
internationally and are essential for icing these choosers’
participation.
Still, it could enfranchise numerous overseas and military
choosers who submit ballots well before Election Day but face postal conveyance
detainments, If the Court rules that ballots arriving after Election Day must
be disqualified despite being posted on time.
