U.S. Supreme Court Allows Pennsylvania to Count Provisional Ballots
However, the PA Supreme Court issued a stay on ruling allowing state to count undated mail-in ballots.
Oh, look. It’s Pennsylvania again. Let’s see if I can keep this story straight.
The U.S. Supreme Court, 9-0, rejected the GOP’s request to block the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s decision allowing voters with faulty mail-in ballots to submit provisional ballots.
A person receives a provisional ballot for a few reasons, including faulty mail-in ballots.
These are “known as ‘challenge’ or ‘affidavit’ ballots in some states, are required by the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA).”
Justice Samuel Alito explained his reasoning:
The lower court’s judgment concerns just two votes in the long-completed Pennsylvania primary. Staying that judgment would not impose any binding obligation on any of the Pennsylvania officials who are responsible for the conduct of this year’s election. And because the only state election officials who are parties in this case are the members of the board of elections in one small county, we cannot order other election boards to sequester affected ballots. For these reasons, I agree with the order denying the application.
On October 23, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that “’the casting of a provisional ballot is specifically authorized in the [state] Election Code’ and that ‘[p]rovisional ballots exist as a failsafe to preserve access to the right to vote.’”
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court did grant the GOP one win: it paused a ruling that allowed the state to count mail-in ballots without a date.
The case revolves around 69 undated ballots during a special election earlier this year in Philadelphia:
The appellate court said the decision applied to 69 undated ballots from a Philadelphia special election that took place earlier this year, but the Republican National Committee argued in court papers that the decision would “unleash chaos” in the 2024 general election.
The RNC said state law made clear that undated mail-in ballots should not be counted and that the appellate court undermined that, effectively causing confusion for other counties outside of Philadelphia right before Election Day.
How about we move Election Day to a Saturday and vote in person? Those overseas can mail their ballots.
What a mess.
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Comments
The win here seems to be that undated ballots will not be counted.
Seems a good thing to win!
Yeah… seems like the big issue in this case was really the one in small print. The others were meaningless camouflage.
“Paused” on the undated mail ballots. That suggests that they kicked the can down the road.
The ruling to disallow undated ballots is a big deal b/c upholds the critical principle that ballots which don’t meet the requirements of the statutes are defective. Give an inch on that and some folks will run wild. Hopefully this bodes well for a challenge to the Nevada case where the State Supreme CT ruled ballots without a date could be counted up to 3 days after election day despite the statutory requirement to discard ballots without a clear post mark showing the voter mailed it prior to election day.
That is not true. On the contrary, the statute explicitly requires counting ballots with a postmark on which the date is illegible.
The statute doesn’t say that there must be a postmark at all; nor does it say there doesn’t. The court ruled that no postmark should be treated the same as a postmark with no legible date. The ballots still came through the postal system, and the date can’t be read (because it isn’t there) so the statute fits.
Ballots with no postmark almost certainly didn’t come through the postal system, they came from someone’s trunk.
Milhouse knows that.
He’s probably got about a hundred thousand of them himself, all marked out and ready for when they know what they’ve got to have to install Kamala–the same way they installed Biden.
Why do you think he’s been so defensive about this?
Voting is a privilege, not a right.
But you’d never know that if you listened only to Ds.
It’s neither a privilege nor a right. It’s an obligation of a free man (and I use that word intentionally) who pays taxes and owns property. However, all that has been thrown out the window and the results are there for all to see.
Not true. The constitution explicitly refers to it as a right.
(Though it isn’t a constitutionally protected right. It’s a right granted by state legislation, or by the state constitution, and the US constitution merely restricts the ways in which the states can limit that right.)
A contrived “mess” that could easily be resolved by going back to paper ballots, positive ID, verified absentee ballots and a single day for voting, which could be a paid if you vote day off.
But no, the Democrats fight ALL of that while claiming that our voting process is “the most secure in history.”
If you are fighting EVERY measure to ensure ballot integrity, you obviously don’t want ballot integrity.
I propose we move Martin Luther King Day to the first Tues in November. What a great tribute that would be!
We could change the name to MLK: Let My People Go! Day, and make it a paid holiday for everybody; bound to get Dem support.
And then eliminate early and mail-in voting.
I would support that enthusiastically. The problem is we’d still get stuck with so-called early voting and absentee/vote-by-mail. Like most other western countries, I wouldn’t allow vote-by-mail at all, perhaps with some consideration made to US service members serving in overseas assignments.
That time has passed. The race-baiters don’t like MLK anymore. He spoke too much of real equality, not Trojan horse equity.
once the rock is cracked
there is nothing that can stop the rest of its demise
They are cheating again.
I hope Trump wins by enough of a margin that the cheating fails.
The answer should be clear and simple. If you wish your vote to count, follow the goddamn directions…
…and don’t drink the windshield washer fluid!
We are talking about people who did follow the directions. It’s not their fault that the post office didn’t postmark their envelopes.
While it is possible for a letter to get stuck behind another as it goes the machine that postmarks mail, it is not possible for that unpostmarked envelope to get past the machine that checks for postmarks unless it stays stuck to the letter.
But then nit would get caught by the machine that sorts the mail for sending out.
Do you see the problem yet, Democrat?
Every possible failsafe would have to fail before a non-postmarked letter could get through.
And THAT would not happen in the bulk that Dems like yourself use to slip in fake ballots –oops! excuse me– ‘real’ ballots without a postmark.
Two things I hadn’t realised until today.
1. just how utterly corrupt voting is in California! I had no idea Democrats had made it illegal to ask for ID when voting?
2. That Democrats have been swamping the swing Stayes with millions of illegal immigrants.
People are not kidding when saying if Trump loses there will no longer be any point in voting in the future. Democrats are working hard to make future voting a waste of time.
On many levels. Because if you vote D, the person you’re “voting for” likely isn’t going to be the actual officeholder, either.
It’s illegal in NY as well (unless the poll book specifically marks the voter as “REQ ID”).
If I hadn’t already voted I’d have cut out holes in a garbage bag to wear as a shirt with an orange vest over top of it.