“The Postal Service is abiding by these injunctions, which are also currently under appeal."
Jim Saksa at Democracy Docket:
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) confirmed it is following a pair of court orders blocking it from implementing President Donald Trump’s anti-mail voting executive order.
“The Postal Service is abiding by these injunctions, which are also currently under appeal,” Postmaster General David Steiner and Amber McReynolds, chairwoman of the USPS board of governors, wrote Monday in a letter to Senate Democrats obtained by Democracy Docket.
The USPS leaders were responding to concerns Democratic senators raised in a letter after Trump issued his executive order in March. That order directed the Postal Service to only deliver mail ballots if states handed over a list of preapproved voters. The senators later reiterated their concerns after USPS published a proposed rule to execute the order in June.
Trump’s directive also mandated USPS to develop secure ballot envelopes with unique barcodes for tracking and utilize them ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
USPS’s letter contends that, even though the agency proposed the rule in response to the executive order, the changes themselves would be “consistent with the Postal Service’s existing — and longstanding — recommended best practices.”
Good news: The USPS won’t be implementing the Trump Regime’s highly un-American executive order targeting vote-by-mail (EO 14399).
Step by step, the Trump administration is moving forward with implementing President Donald Trump’s anti-mail voting executive order — despi
Yunior Rivas at Democracy Docket:
Step by step, the Trump administration is moving forward with implementing President Donald Trump’s anti-mail voting executive order — despite an expert consensus that the order is unconstitutional and ongoing efforts to block it in court.
In a notice filed Thursday in federal court, the administration said the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) has begun the process of creating a new records system to track mail ballots.
In a proposed rule published earlier this month, USPS said it would require states to send it information about voters who request mail-in or absentee ballots for federal elections. Voting rights advocates have warned that the rule could disrupt mail voting and give the federal government unprecedented power over a process traditionally run by states.
The new filing is not the final rule. But it shows USPS is laying the groundwork to collect and maintain records related to mail-in and absentee ballots while multiple lawsuits challenging Trump’s order continue.
And it comes the same day the administration disclosed a separate DHS memo showing that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services is on track to deliver citizenship-list infrastructure to states by June 30.
[...]
“Earlier today, pursuant to 5 U.S.C. § 552a(r), the Postal Service has provided advance notice of a proposed new General Privacy Act System of Records (‘SORN’) to coincide with its proposal to amend the Mailing Standards of the United States Postal Service, Domestic Mail Manual (DMM), regarding the transmission of mail-in or absentee ballots for federal elections,” the filing states.
In plain English, a system of records notice is a formal notice agencies must file when they plan to keep a new set of records about people. Here, the records system is tied to USPS’ proposed mail ballot rule.
Shame on the USPS for taking steps to implement Satan 47’s executive order (EO 14399) attacking vote-by-mail.
Trump himself has voted by mail in recent elections.
Yunior Rivas at Democracy Docket:
President Donald Trump signed a sweeping executive order Tuesday targeting mail-in voting and escalating his long-running effort to restrict voting access ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
“Cheating on mail-in voting is legendary. It’s horrible,” Trump said while signing the order. “Democrats want to use it for cheating.”
Election experts immediately said the order would be rejected by the courts. One told Democracy Docket it’s “unconstitutional on its face.”
Still, the order marks the most aggressive federal action yet in Trump’s campaign against mail-in voting, which he has repeatedly attacked with false claims of widespread fraud.
Despite those claims, election officials across the country — including Republicans — have consistently found mail-in voting to be secure and reliable. Trump himself has voted by mail in recent elections.
The order directs the Department of Homeland Security to work with the Social Security Administration to create lists of verified U.S. citizens eligible to vote in each state. It also instructs the U.S. Postal Service to only send absentee ballots to voters on approved lists and mandates the use of secure ballot envelopes with unique barcodes for tracking.
States would receive updated mail voter lists at least 60 days before federal elections, while the attorney general is directed to prioritize investigations into cases involving ballots sent to ineligible voters.
States that do not comply with the new requirements could face a loss of federal funding.
Tuesday’s action also builds on a pattern of executive overreach that has already faced significant resistance in the courts.
Previous Trump executive orders attempting to impose nationwide election rules — including proof-of-citizenship requirements and federal control over voter registration processes — were blocked by federal courts, which ruled that the president cannot unilaterally rewrite election law.
Yesterday, Tyrant-in-Chief (and repeated vote-by-mail user) Donald Trump signs an unconstitutional executive order aimed at cracking down on vote-by-mail.
See Also:
Daily Kos: Trump ramps up his unconstitutional crusade against mail-in voting
“As this court has explained... the [executive order] is unconstitutional,” the judge wrote.
Jim Saksa at Democracy Docket:
A federal judge in Massachusetts has refused to dismiss a lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s executive order (EO) targeting mail voting, setting the stage for the challenge to proceed.
In her order Wednesday, U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani called the order “unconstitutional” and said that, if allowed to stand, “disenfranchisement as to the upcoming election is plausibly likely and imminent.”
The Trump administration argued that the lawsuit, filed by a coalition of voting rights groups led by the League of Women Voters (LWV), should have been tossed as premature and for failing to state an actionable claim. But U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani disagreed, allowing it to continue.
“Plaintiffs’ organizational and associational injuries are caused by the EO’s novel voting regulation mandates and enjoining the EO would cure those injuries,” Talwani wrote.
The decision suggests that Talwani will likely find that LWV can show that, if the EO isn’t blocked, they will suffer the “irreparable harm” required for a court to grant the preliminary injunction plaintiffs are seeking.
The executive order directs states to send the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) a list of voters who asked to vote by mail and to develop new envelopes with barcodes linked to those voters for mail ballots. The Postal Service would then refuse to deliver ballots to unlisted voters or ballot envelopes without the barcode.
Talwani already blocked the order’s implementation in 22 states and Washington D.C. in a separate lawsuit launched by those jurisdictions, which she alluded to in her order Wednesday.
“As this court has explained, Section 3 of the EO is unconstitutional,” Talwani wrote. “The ‘Constitution lodges power over congressional elections in state legislatures primarily and in Congress ultimately. The President plays no role in the regulation of elections.”
Judge Indira Talwani issues a ruling in League of Women Voters of Massachusetts v. Trump that the Trump Regime’s executive order attacking vote by mail is highly unconstitutional.
See Also:
ACLU: Federal Judge Finds Disenfranchisement is ‘Plausibly Likely and Imminent’ Due to Executive Order Restricting Mail Voting
Trump's sweeping assault on mail voting won’t be carried out in 23 states and D.C. ahead of November's midterms.
Brentin Mock at Democracy Docket:
The U.S. First Circuit Court of Appeals denied the Trump administration’s request to pause a lower court order that blocks the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) from executing the president’s March executive order attacking mail voting.
The decision means President Donald Trump’s sweeping assault on mail voting won’t be carried out in 23 states and the District of Columbia. The three-judge panel ruled 2-1 against the Trump administration’s motion, with one – Judge Joshua D. Dunlap, a Trump appointee – dissenting to part of the ruling.
U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani’s June 25 ruling that the USPS can’t refuse to deliver mail ballots to states that refuse to comply with the U.S. Justice Department’s (DOJ) demands for their unredacted voter lists will remain in place.
Judge Talwani’s ruling pointed out that complying with Trump’s executive order’s unusual demands would mean states would be financially burdened for making changes to its mail ballot envelopes. The executive order directs the USPS to control states’ mail ballot designs by ensuring they have unique Intelligent Mail barcodes and logos on the envelopes.
The postal service is expected to impose these changes even for states that have already purchased mail-in ballot envelopes for the year.
The appeals court panel was not moved, however, by the Trump administration’s argument that such costs should be disregarded, for now, because the USPS has yet to issue any final rules on the new designs.
Great news: A 3-judge panel on the 1st Circuit Court ruled 2-1 that the Trump Regime’s assault on vote-by-mail will be blocked in 23 states and DC.
See Also:
Reuters, via HuffPost: U.S. Appeals Court Rules Trump Cannot Implement Mail-In Voting Order
"The Order ‘may not prove feasible to implement in any manner whatsoever,’" the judges wrote.
Jim Saksa at Democracy Docket:
A federal appeals court is letting the Trump administration continue implementing President Donald Trump’s anti-mail voting executive order. The ruling Tuesday comes a day after the administration asked the U.S. Supreme Court to lift a block on implementing the order in 23 Democratic-led states and Washington, D.C. upheld in a separate case.
Together, the twin developments over the last 24 hours suggest that with midterm voting set to begin in under two months, a resolution to the high-stakes voting question — in which large numbers of voters are at risk of having their mail ballots go uncounted — may soon be approaching.
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia affirmed a lower court’s decision, holding that a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Trump’s March 2026 edict was premature because the administration hasn’t executed it yet.
“[W]hile Plaintiffs have identified a number of serious questions concerning the lawfulness of proposed actions if implemented on the threshold of the upcoming federal election, this case likely is unripe for review in its present posture,” the judges wrote. “If the defendant agencies take steps to implement the Executive Order in a manner that violates federal law or the Constitution, Plaintiffs can promptly seek relief, which the district court and this court can decide in as expeditious a manner as circumstances require.”
But in a potential positive sign for voters, the court also noted that, for procedural reasons, it had not considered the steps USPS had taken over the last few weeks to implement the order.
[...]
After Trump signed the executive order in March, which ordered the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) to send mail ballots in new barcoded envelopes only to voters on citizenship lists compiled by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Social Security Administration, Democratic groups led by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee quickly sued.* But U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols denied the preliminary injunction in May, saying it would be premature to issue it when the federal agencies hadn’t begun implementation yet.
The D.C. circuit court’s opinion comes just days after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit ruled against the Trump administration Saturday, affirming the preliminary injunction a federal court in Massachusetts issued blocking the executive order’s implementation in 23 states and Washington, D.C. There, the circuit court panel rejected the government’s appeal 2-1, with one – Judge Joshua D. Dunlap, a Trump appointee – dissenting to part of the ruling.
The DC Circuit Court’s 3-judge panel backs the Trump Regime’s bid to enact its heinous anti-voting rights VBM executive order permitting restrictions on vote-by-mail ballots.
The systems are expected to be operational by June 30 — less than a month after DHS approved the proposal.
Yunior Rivas at Democracy Docket:
The Trump administration has approved a plan to create a federal voter citizenship verification system for state voter rolls, according to a court filing submitted Friday. It is also exploring the use of U.S. Postal Service data to monitor mail-in ballots, marking a significant step toward implementing some of the most controversial parts of President Donald Trump’s sweeping anti-voting executive order.
The filing, submitted by the Department of Justice in multiple lawsuits challenging the Order, provides the clearest signal yet that the administration is actively moving to implement the order’s voter citizenship provisions. Voting rights advocates have warned those provisions could threaten eligible voters’ access to the ballot.
According to the notice, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) approved a recommendation from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on June 4 regarding implementation of the executive order’s citizenship verification requirements.
“On June 4, 2026, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) approved a recommendation from the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) regarding implementation of Executive Order 14,399, including the creation of State Citizenship Lists as contemplated in § 2 of Executive Order 14,399,” the filing states.
The newly approved plan would operate in two parts.
First, state election officials would be permitted to submit entire statewide voter registration lists to USCIS’s SAVE database. SAVE is a federal system that was originally built to verify immigration status for government benefit programs, not voter eligibility.
The second component would create a new portal allowing state election officials to access citizenship-related data maintained by USCIS, the Social Security Administration and the State Department. The underlying information would remain inside each agency’s existing systems.
The anti-American and Satan-loving Trump Regime has approved a plan to create a federal voter citizenship verification system for state voter rolls as part of the Trump Regime’s war on voting rights.
