In what will likely be the first election law case heard by the Supreme Court will hear after Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, the GOP issued notice that it plans to appeal a Pennsylvania law regarding mail-in voting to the nation’s highest court, the Washington Post reports.
The case revolves around a provision in the state that allows mail-in ballots to be counted if they are postmarked by Election Day “unless a preponderance of the evidence” demonstrates that the ballot was mailed after Election Day. Most post offices close at 5:30 p.m., and voting in Pennsylvania ends at 8 p.m., so ballots would have to be mailed prior to the first announcements of voting outcomes.
In their ongoing quest to undermine election integrity, republicans claimed that dishonest voters could cram mailboxes with ballots to swing elections after polling places have closed.
Republicans may have also undermined their own argument, however. In their brief to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court declaring their appeal, the GOP noted, “The Elections Clause of the United States Constitution vests the authority to regulate the times, places, and manner, of federal elections to Pennsylvania’s General Assembly, subject only to alteration by Congress, not this Court.”
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has been an unhappy place for republicans recently, as the Court struck down a number of voting-related suits filed by the GOP, including the use of ballot drop boxes and the illegality of having poll watchers from outside the county in polling places.