The Pennsylvania Supreme Court is closer to Election Day to consider changing the rules for mail-in voting

by Carter Walker, Votebeat

Photo courtesy of Matt Smith / For Spotlight PA

The rejections mean that the rules for mail-in voting will likely remain largely unchanged in the Nov. 5 presidential election.

This article is made possible by Spotlight PAs Collaboration with Votebeata nonpartisan news organization covering local election administration and voting. Sign up for Votebeat’s free newsletter here.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court refused to immediately answer two outstanding questions about mail-in voting rules before the November election, saying Election Day was too close to reconsider the law now.

The court on Saturday rejected two petitions from groups that had requested an emergency decision. One was a request from voting rights groups represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, which have long sought to end enforcement of the dating requirements for mail-in ballots. The other was a call from Republican groups to end the policy in counties that notifies voters of errors with their mail-in ballots and gives them a chance to fix the errors.

“This court will neither mandate nor advocate substantive changes to existing laws and procedures,” the court wrote in its rejection of the ACLU’s petition in the midst of an ongoing election.

The rejections mean that the rules for mail-in voting will likely remain largely unchanged in the Nov. 5 presidential election, although some other cases on the issue are still pending. The ruling also signals that the Supreme Court may take to heart criticism in 2020 that it changed election rules late in the game.

“Changing election law in the middle of an election is never a good idea, and the parties in these cases have had four years to take stock and take the matter to court,” said Mercer County elections director Thad Hall.

For voters and election officials, the rules for the November election are now clearer than they were last week, unless a different court ruling comes before the election. In order for ballots to be counted, voters must write the correct date on their envelope. But voters in certain districts are informed of such errors and allowed to fix them.

The court makes decisions as voting begins

The ACLU and the Public Interest Law Center argued in their petition to the court last month that requiring mail-in ballots to be dated violates voting rights protections in the state constitution and sought to bypass lower courts for a quick ruling straight from the vote State Supreme Court. The petition was the latest development in a long-running legal battle over the requirement that has seen courts argue back and forth this year over whether election officials can enforce the date requirement, resulting in thousands of ballots being rejected each election.

But the state Supreme Court ruled Saturday that it would not consider changing the rules again before the election. Postal voting is already taking place in many districts.

“While it is disappointing that our request for review was denied, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has still not ruled on the merits of our argument that enforcement of the handwritten date rule violates voters’ constitutional rights,” said the ACLU of Pennsylvania in a statement. “We hope that when the next case on this issue comes before them, they will consider the important constitutional issue at stake. … Voters should not be disqualified because of an insignificant human error.”

One judge, Chief Justice Debra Todd, disagreed and said she believed the court should take the case.

“The issue before us is of great importance,” she wrote. “Our county election boards, the Secretary of State, the courts of this Commonwealth, which are primarily charged with deciding election matters, and the voters themselves need clarity on this issue before Election Day when ballots are collected.”

In the other petition rejected Saturday, the Republican National Committee and the Pennsylvania GOP asked the Supreme Court to end the “notice-and-cure” system, a practice in some counties in which voters are notified of disqualifying errors on their mail-in ballots and given the opportunity to resolve them.

The RNC argued that the practice “disrespects the law.”

According to an analysis by Votebeat and Spotlight PA, around 30 counties have such policies, including many Republican-leaning areas. Many counties have had such policies in place since the 2020 election.

On Saturday, the court said Republicans waited too long to challenge and failed to demonstrate the need for quick action. As a result, the state’s patchwork of notice and remedial measures will remain in place for the 2024 election.

An RNC spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.