By J.C. Bruce
A federal judge in Boston has once again blocked Donald Trump’s illegal scheme to disrupt the midterm elections by making it more difficult to vote by mail.
Judge Indira Talwani, for the third time, told the 80-year-old president “no” and issued an injunction prohibiting the administration from implementing a half-baked plan to force states to:
Redo all their mail-in ballot envelopes.
Add specific bar codes.
Submit lists of “approved voters” and ensure that the newfangled bar codes match those names.
A Postal Service whistleblower earlier in the week revealed that the system was likely to malfunction, denying untold thousands of voters the right to vote. And when Judge Talwani pressed government lawyers on this earlier in the week, they couldn’t promise the system would work.
So, on Friday she extended her temporary restraining order into an indefinite injunction.
Just in time, too, as some states, such as North Carolina, are already mailing out ballots and other states, such as Florida, will be doing so soon.
But the drama isn’t over yet. Justice Department lawyers tried to overturn Talwani’s earlier temporary restraining order at an appeals court, and when that failed, they begged the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene.
All that would seem moot now with the judge’s new order, but government lawyers said they might start the appeals process all over again.
It’s a reasonable bet this will land once again at the Supreme Court very soon.
There are a couple of issues here:
First, the Constitution grants the states, not the federal government, the authority to run elections. And it is clear that all this is just Trump’s attempt to suppress voting in the midterms, knowing Democrats and independents use mail-in ballots more than Republicans.
So, it is unconstitutional.
Also, as a practical matter—and Judge Talwani cited this—it’s just too late in the election cycle to be experimenting with new schemes like this, legal, illegal, or otherwise.
Ballots are being mailed already or are being prepared to be sent out. And Trump’s untested screening system at the Post Office is bound to break down.
“Having considered this series of hurdles for officials against the backdrop of an impending election, and mindful of the fact that any minor malfunction will result in the denial of mail ballots, the court concludes that disenfranchisement for plaintiff organizations’ members, regardless of residence, is practically inevitable,” Judge Talwani wrote.
Democrats are grateful.
“We are glad that this court has stopped the Postal Service from impacting who can receive a ballot in the 2026 election,” Jena Griswold, Colorado’s secretary of state, said in a statement. “The Postal Service must stick to its job of delivering the mail, rather than trying to decide who gets to vote.”
That said, The New York Times reports that Justice Department lawyers representing the Postal Service say they were likely to appeal this decision and “start the process again.”
After all, even if Trump’s illegal scheme is blocked, he and his minions at the DOJ are still managing to create doubt about mail-in voting. And that was always the goal.
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J.C. Bruce
The “Elections Clause “ of the Constitution is quite specific and well established. Basically, it states that elections for representatives and senators are the province of each state’s legislature. It also says that those legislatures are responsible for instituting and regulating the process from start to finish. My concern is that some deep red states legislatures may see this untenable influence over the post office as a blueprint for complying with the Trump’s EO, not for this midterms cycle but the general elections in two years. Hopefully, this midterm will bring a change that rids the country of this corrupt administration's nut case supreme leader!
I took a few minutes this morning and discovered that from the president on down, the military, the Supreme Court (two oaths) the senate, the house etc. take an oath to protect the Constitution of the United States. There are several punishments from censures to impeachment, jail, etc. It seems the military are the only ones who take this really seriously. The President, VP, their staffs, the Supreme Court, Congress, Senate all seem to be not worried about taking away the rights guaranteed to Americans by the Constitution, voting, women's rights etc.
After he and his family MAILED IN their ballots, he then pushed to have mail in ballots for the rest of us not acceptable (unless of course you are a republican).
How long are we all going to sit around while this demented dictator gets away with defying the courts, Constitution and spending OUR money stealing countries and their assets without permission but just on his whim. He uses our armed services men and women like disposable pawns. Again, HE IS ACCOUNTABLE TO NO ONE!
Please make every effort to vote in upcoming elections for people who will represent ALL Americans and remember all humans have rights.
Once we unseat these people, let us also enact practices and laws that will never allow something like this defiance of justice to occur.