Appeals Court: Pennsylvania Can Throw Out Mail-In Ballots Without Dates or Wrong Dates
Pennsylvania’s dating requirement does not violate, the Materiality Provision, we reverse the District Court’s order and remand for it to consider the merits of the Plaintiffs’ equal protection challenge.”
The U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 that Pennsylvania can throw out mail ballots that do not have a date or the wrong date.
The majority held that the date requirement on a mail-in ballot does not violate the Materiality Provision of the Civil Rights Act. The Vote Rights Act of 1965 applied it to all state elections.
Bottom line: The Materiality Provision addresses the voter and qualification. The date requirement is unrelated to a person’s eligibility to vote, only how the vote is cast. They have nothing to do with each other.
Now, let’s dissect the opinion.
Circuit Judge Thomas Ambro noted the state ballot rule:
Mail-in and absentee voters, for their part, must sign and date the declaration printed on the return envelope containing their mail ballot. The date requirement, it turns out, serves little apparent purpose. It is not used to confirm timely receipt of the ballot or to determine when the voter completed it. But the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania ruled that dating the envelope is mandatory, and undated or misdated ballots are invalid under its state law and must be set aside.
Pay attention to the italicized words, which the court did in the opinion
Ambro said the court’s role is to interpret a statute. Therefore, the majority holds that the “Materiality Provision only applies when the State is determining who may vote,” meaning the provision’s “role stops at the door of the voting place.”
The majority wrote that the provision does not affect rules like the date requirement, which governs “how a qualified voter must cast his ballot for it to be counted.”
Who and how. This is important. The court interpreted the statute to apply to WHO, and the rule to apply to HOW.
Who and how are not the same things.
The provision states:
No person acting under color of law shall . . . deny the right of any individual to vote in any election because of an error or omission on any record or paper relating to any application, registration, or other act requisite to voting, if such error or omission is not material in determining whether such individual is qualified under State law to vote in such election
The provision did not receive much attention in the courts until recent elections after the Democrats lost their minds in 2016 when former Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton (LOLOLOLOLOL).
No one followed the rules (I removed the citations within the quotes) (emphasis mine):
But in the November 2020 and November 2022 elections, thousands of Pennsylvania mail-in voters did not comply with the date requirement. Some voters omitted the date altogether, others put shortened or obviously incorrect dates. As county boards took different approaches to enforcing the date requirement, litigation began, and the Materiality Provision took center stage. A panel of this Court ruled this federal law does apply outside the voter registration context and was violated by the date requirement now (again) before us. But that decision has since been vacated as moot by the Supreme Court.
The validity of enforcing the date requirement thus remained uncertain as a matter of federal law. But the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania soon settled the issue for state law purposes. It unanimously agreed the command in Pennsylvania’s Election Code that mail-in voters “shall . . . date” the declaration was “unambiguous and mandatory” as a matter of statutory interpretation; so omitting the date, or incorrectly dating the return envelope, “render[s] a ballot invalid” under Pennsylvania law. Id. at 20-22. The Court also rejected the argument that a declaration with an incorrect date was “sufficient,” reasoning that “[i]mplicit in the Election Code’s textual command . . . is the understanding that ‘date’ refers to the day upon which an elector signs the declaration.” So, under Pennsylvania law, non compliant ballots are invalid. The Court evenly divided, however, on whether failing to count non-compliant ballots violated the Materiality Provision. That question thus was bound to return to us.
This is where we get into the merits of the case. The majority found that connecting the Materiality Provision to voter qualification rules “tie state legislatures’ hands in setting voting rules unrelated to voter eligibility.”
The provision only mentions voting; it never mentions casting the actual ballot. People conflate the two, but those are separate actions. Dating ties into casting the ballot, which goes back to HOW: “And so an outer ballot envelope falls outside the Materiality Provision’s scope.”
Dissenting Justice Patty Schwartz relied more on definitions, but her conclusion has great advice:
Today’s ruling is a clear reminder that all voters must carefully review and comply with every instruction and requirement imposed upon them. If they do not, they risk having their otherwise valid votes discounted based on even the most inconsequential mistake.
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Comments
Bottom line: People who sit in a room all night filling out thousands of these ballots need to take a break every so often. Go outside, have a smoke, drink a red bull and come back feeling alert so you don’t make so many mistakes. Attention to detail people!!!!
Hey! What do you expect from people working for a lousy $20 an hour minimum wage?
This calls into question the integrity of the vote process of battleground state of PA. Can this be applied to other battleground states?
For those States within the 3rd Federal Circuit whose legislature has passed similar statutes and for which there is a Plaintiff (s) with an active case/controversy to bring…then yes.
Now I’m confused. Didn’t I read right here on LI within the past week that in Pennsylvania, rules were bent so far in the 2020 election that ballots were accepted and counted which were entirely undated, or dated up to a week after election day?
In our mindless quest for universal voting rights, we have thrown common sense and order out the window.
People who are too incompetent to fulfill the very simple instructions required to cast a ballot should necessarily disqualify themselves. Instead, the states seem content to view any feeble attempt as “good enough, let’s count it.” Hanging chads in 2000 were the first, mot public demonstration of this tendency.
Democrats, not surprisingly use this tendency to their own advantage and of course if you dilute the requirements for what constitutes a valid ballot, you nearly guarantee the possibility of fraud in the counting.
Glad to see this tiny move by Penn Supremes going against the grain of “good enough.”
From long term military assessment of potential recruits, 10% of the (voting) population is incompetent. Hence, the need to make voting so idiot proof that the idiots will have someone fill out their ballot even if they never knew who the surrogate voters was. By inference, they would vote Democrat straight party line.
The hanging chads were a result of a design flaw in the ballot. The voter punched through the appropriate spot, but the chad did not fully detatch. The voter would have no means of knowning there was still a rectangle of paper dangling by a corner which would interfere with machine counting of the ballot.
We’re a little beyond that now….
Now it’s rogue electrons
https://verifiedvoting.org/publication/summary-of-the-problem-with-electronic-voting/
Sort of, but not really. The fault was in the punches themselves which over time had worn away slightly to where the punch would not “cut” the ballot completely.
We had the same issue in Brevard County, Florida before the 2000 election. The County Commission was shown the voting “punches” by the Supervisor of Elections where no matter how hard one pushed the lever down or how many times the punch was depressed, the “chads” would sometimes not release.
Brevard County then went to optic ballots which may be the best balloting system as there is a hard record of the ballots that can be matched to a real voter and recounted over and over by machine or by hand.
no, the voting machine manufacturer demonstrated on TV that the only was to produce a hanging chad was to punch multiple ballots at the same time
Up in Brevard, the maker of the machines demonstrated the same thing.
What they brought to the Commission were new machines – not ones that were used, especially ones that had been used for many years.
The Supervisor of Elections at the time was ready (as they were looking for new ballot counting devices) and had brought a digital micrometer with them. The actual punches had worn down with time from the new ones.
Funny thing is that Brevard replaced their machines in 1998. They paid for them with County tax money. The punch machines replaced in other counties were done with State funds.
The hanging chads were the result of stacking as many ballots as could fit into the machine into it. 5, as it turns out.
When you try to use the stylus you get one definite good vote, maybe two. The third and forth will likely have a ‘hanging’ or a ‘pregnant'(meaning deeply dimpled chad, and the fifth will be a ‘dimpled’ chad.
For anyone who didn’t live through it, these were terms in common parlance all throughout the counting in 2000.
You cannot ‘dimple’ a chad if the ballot in misplaced or if there’s nothing behind the ballot. If the ballot is placed wrong it backs onto a solid surface and doesn’t move. If it’s correctly placed the perforations tear and the chad falls into the hole.
Most of these ballots never went through a machine. But if they had, the ‘hanging chads would not have been an impediment.
aza – I have also been stating that the dimpled chads were due to punching multiple ballots at the same time – also noting no scratch marks on the paper.
Reasonably obvious signs of fraud.
Leftists dont like facts
Gitarserver and Uncivil servant
Hanging chads may have been due to a piece of the chad not separating from the card
The dimpled chad was due to punching multiple ballots and the same time. The dimpled chads often had no scratch marks on the ballot from the pin
Even worse than the hanging chads were the dimpled chads
I have dimples, but have never been called a “chad.” I have, however, been called worse.
I’m surprised the Penn Supremes did this, given that they didn’t care to stop it in 2020 when it was convenient to get rid of Trump. The only reason I can see that makes it different now is they don’t see Trump losing even if they enabled this kind of vote fraud, so they might as well do the right thing. They will probably reverse themselves again in the unlikely event a popular successor to Trump emerges and a stop is needed.
What is unusual is the judges are
Clinton appointee
Obama appointee
Biden appointee
The dissent – Schwartz is an obama appointee
After the bush-gore election dispute, FL tightened up its standards and a battleground state become solid red. That’s the real reason that Dems are fighting this with everything they have. They are afraid they can’t win otherwise.
*became
Pay attention to the italicized words, which the court did in the opinion
WHICH italicized words? I don’t see any in the preceding quoted paragraph.
“Who” and “how.” But they may have been fixed after you read the article.
Yeah, and I’m good with that.
thousands of Pennsylvania mail-in voters did not comply with the date requirement
Wouldn’t this be the epitome of “citing facts not in evidence” cf the word “voters”?
Today’s ruling is a clear reminder that all voters must carefully review and comply with every instruction and requirement imposed upon them.
“Buh…buh…but requiring voters to follow the instructions is sooooo unfair! It’s voter suppression!” You know somebody will say it.
I question the value of a vote cast by someone who can’t follow instructions. But I am a curmudgeon.
Yo! Requiring voters to “follow the instructions” is White Supremacy, don’t cha know?
You mean like the 200,000 reportedly prepared by the USPS Union in NYC and delivered the afternoon of the 2020 election and counted after the 11PM hiatus in counting propelling Biden into the lead?
The court ruling is final, fraudulent biden votes must be thrown into the garbage of history.
Only 4 years too late
There is no evidence for that rumor.
CAN throw out or MUST throw out?
The state law says “must” – but the voters have no alternative but to trust to the integrity of the persons reviewing and counting the ballots. In other words, the people of PA are SoL.
They could volunteer to be trained as a poll watcher and observe/report/document violations. PA requires that a poll watcher con only work in their own precinct so outreach and willing volunteers in every precinct is vital to meet the goal.
Ah yes, if I’m not mistaken it was in a Philly voting precinct in the 2012 election where they actually had the voting booths in a gymnasium with a massive mural of Barack Obama painted on the wall, depicting him in a Jesus-like pose with a halo over his head. One of many inner-city precincts that regularly vote 95%+ for the D candidate.
As if that matters, we saw all manner of Republican poll watchers thrown out of the building during ballot counts in 2020. If there were any lawsuits about that they were all thrown out, establishing the precedent for future elections that they can be thrown out again.
Surrender before the contest doesn’t seem like a very effective strategy to get a victory.
Showing up to the contest prepared to put in the work required to achieve a win as well as having done all hard work of organizing and preparing in advance of the contest are necessary components to prevail.
Half assed efforts and a victim mindset are almost certain to result in a defeat before the contest begins.
That makes sense. State law says “must.” Someone challenged – “They can’t do that.” The court said, “Yes, they may.”
Dating is NOT an inconsequential requirement. The day after the polls close, I can fill out and sign the ballot which is invalid if not filled out before the polls close, and I have done nothing illegal. If I also date fill out yesterday’s date, THEN I have committed perjury.
Thank you for something I wasn’t thinking of.
But I am afraid we would still need some way and some one to object to perjury on ballots- but at least it would be a clear and defined offense.
How about just eliminating mail ballots altogether?
Traditional absentee ballots, utilized and submitted for legitimate reasons, should be continued, but “mail ballots” should not be.
All forms of early voting should also be eliminated.
Yep that’s what we still do in Alabama. I could see an argument for a week of early in person voting IF States allowed poll watchers to be from outside the precinct to ensure someone was observing the entire process.
This is a honest compromise. I could even see two weeks of early, in person voting. If there is some reason that someone has no time to vote in those two weeks, and they can provide proof, then and only then can an absentee ballot be issued.
If they got a whole damn week to vote in person and fail to figure it out ….that’s on the them not the rest of us. To keep polls open for a week you gotta also get folks to run the damn place and get volunteers for election observers. That’s asking a whole lot already from the rest of us (aka the system/community).
Now you want to further coddle some jackass that can’t figure out a way to get to the polls during an entire week or more (two weeks is too long)….eff that. If someone can’t muster up the sense of civic pride and individual responsibility to cast an in person ballot for week long period nope, try again next time.
muh voting rights, rayciss!
don’t threaten our democracy!
There are people who can’t go vote in person no matter how many weeks you give them. People who are housebound, or in the hospital, or out of town (and can prove it), not to mention the military. It’s reasonable to accommodate them (though it’s also reasonable not to). But this is a small and manageable subset.
It’s my understanding that in Israel there is no postal voting, but a mobile precinct comes to each hospital bed, complete with election judges, poll watchers from the parties, etc, to allow patients to vote in person. The procedure is the same as if they had gone to a precinct. ID checked, envelope and a collection of party ballots provided, privacy screen set up, they put the sealed envelope in the ballot box, and then off to the next patient.
Alabama makes accommodation for those so disabled as to be unable to leave their home. They must request ballot but they gotta provide a notarized letter from their physician attesting to their inability to vote in person. Absentee ballots under medical conditions must also have a signed and notarized letter from the voter appointing a Spouse, Parent or their adult child to deliver the ballot to the Clerk in person by noon.
Traditional absentee ballots such as military ballots and other overseas ballots are basically it other than very narrow probable medical circumstances. Basically everyone in Alabama who is physically able to show up to the poll must do so in order to try and vote.
I’m a fan of having your ballot mailed to you, fill it out at home, and then turn it in in-person. My November ballot is often three or four pages long with all the state and local races and ballot initiative. After that, some very limited exceptions for mail in.
An “inconsequential” mistake on any other government form, notably a good old 1040, will cost you a lot more than an invalidated vote.
One would have thought this would be an obvious thing that when you fill out a form you have to fill out every part of the form unless it specifically notes that it’s optional. The problem comes when interpreting that form goes to people who can’t even the difference between a boy and a girl
From my reading, the issue is the date on the envelope, and has nothing to do with the ballot form itself.
Think of your tax return: you can fill out the form perfectly, but if you submit it to the IRS after the filing date has passed, you’re subject to a penalty. In the case of the ballot, the penalty is that the vote is discarded.
Yes, but the ballots at issue were received before the election, so there’s no doubt that they were cast in time. The flaw was that the voter either neglected to date his signature, or put a date that can’t be correct, such as a date after the election.
But there were by law invalid ballots. An invalid ballot cast on time doesn’t become valid by virtue of that.
Not if the materiality requirement applies. Hence this case. The original decision was that it does apply, and therefore such ballots have to be accepted despite the state law that says otherwise. Federal law overrides state law. The new decision cleverly parses the federal law, but I’m not convinced that it’s correct.
“The U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 that Pennsylvania can throw out mail ballots that do not have a date or the wrong date.”
Oh, ok. Is this retro-active to 2020?
“Can throw out” but depending on how many votes are needed for the Democrat to win they don’t have to.
That’s where volunteer poll watchers come into play as well as local Attorneys to file if/when shenanigans occur. Without someone watching and an Attorney willing to file and a GoP party apparatus set up to coordinate all this and finance big fish elections law Attorneys then lots of shenanigans WILL happen.
Be careful what you wish for. The courts being as idiotic as they are, they could decide the 2020 prexy race was improperly decided, declare Trump the winner, and then rule that he was term-limited and ineligible to run this year.
No. They may say Trump should have won, but the fact is that he didn’t. The electors voted, congress counted their votes, and Biden got a clear majority. Thus he’s only been elected once and is eligible to be elected a second time.
correct
While Milhouse is right that they can’t really do that, I think it would be hilarious to convince them to try.
So I’m no lawyer, but it says defective ballots CAN be thrown out….the bigger question is WILL they be thrown out by the corrupt leftists in the counting rooms, out of the view of the public? I doubt it. Tape a little cardboard over the window and go to Town!!
In the close-run Bush v Gore election, the DNC sent out a memo to their Florida vote monitors instructing them to invalidate any mail-in ballots lacking a postmark date. The premise being that there was then no proof they were mailed in on time. They were instructed to invalidate even those ballots which arrived before the election date, as apparently arrival before the election was insufficient legal proof they were mailed before the election /s.
Of course what was really the logic behind this electoral Flim flam attempt was the common knowledge that military voters tended (R), many military were serving overseas, and members serving overseas by congressional order could send mail home for free – ie – so without a postmark.
So the leadership of the “every vote must count” party was perfectly willing to not count military members serving overseas in bases or actual war zones.
Fortunately, most polling workers were repulsed by this instruction, especially as they had never tossed un-post-marked military ballots before and it’s thought very few followed this instruction.
I would hope the Pennsylvania ruling takes into account the voting rights of overseas military……