OAN Staff Brooke Mallory
6:40 PM – Monday, September 14, 2026
The U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) has rejected an emergency request from the Trump administration to reinstate new Postal Service rules governing mail-in ballots.
The highest court’s order leaves in place a lower court’s preliminary injunction that blocked the enforcement of key parts of the regulation. As a result, states and local jurisdictions will be able to proceed under their established procedures for sending out absentee and mail-in ballots ahead of the upcoming elections.
The blocked regulations, which stemmed from an executive order (EO) issued earlier this year, aimed to introduce new safeguards for processing election mail.
These included specialized envelope design criteria with unique barcodes, as well as a mandate for state and local election officials to upload voter information into a federal portal to verify eligibility before delivery.
The Trump administration maintained that the measures were a constitutional exercise of statutory Postal Service authority, asserting they were vital steps to curb potential mail ballot fraud and protect the integrity of federal elections.
Opponents of the regulation, including blue state attorneys general (AGs), challenged the policy in court, claiming that implementing the new rules on short notice would “disrupt established voting systems.”
They also contended that complying with the mandate would be “operationally impossible,” risking technical delays and potential errors that could disenfranchise voters. Federal judges presiding over the legal challenges granted preliminary injunctions to halt the policy, concluding that “parts of the rule likely exceeded the statutory power granted to the Postal Service.”
In a brief, unsigned order, SCOTUS ruled that the government was unlikely to succeed on the merits of its challenge against the preliminary injunction. Justice Brett Kavanaugh said in a concurring opinion that applying the proposed rules so close to the election would be arbitrary and capricious, while Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented from the decision.
“The Government has a strong interest in enforcing the rule, and implementing it will also ‘enhance the visibility of Federal Ballot Mail’ in order to better detect election fraud,” Alito wrote. “On the other side of the balance, the plaintiff States invoke the practical effects of implementing the rule close to the midterm elections. I take that problem very seriously, but it is not enough to convince me to deny the application.”
With the high court’s decision, the preliminary injunction remains in effect while litigation continues in the lower courts.
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