WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Boston blocked implementation of President Trump's mail-voting executive order for two weeks on Thursday, and the Justice Department appealed the ruling to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday, the latest turn in a court fight days before states begin mailing general-election ballots.
The back-and-forth resets a legal contest that appeared settled Monday, when the Supreme Court lifted an earlier injunction from the same judge and cleared the U.S. Postal Service to begin carrying out the order. USPS issued its final rule last week, and 24 states then sued anew. The first mail ballots for the Nov. 3 midterms are scheduled to be sent out Sept. 4.
What the order does
U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani, an Obama nominee, issued a 14-day temporary restraining order Thursday that halts sections of the USPS rule mandating envelope standards, state registration and voter enrollment on a federal ballot portal, and that would let the Postal Service refuse to deliver ballots from noncompliant states. A hearing on the underlying case is set for Sept. 3.
Talwani wrote that "Plaintiff states have neither time nor funds to design new mail ballots, seek approval of the new designs, order production of mail ballots, update their own election management systems, train election officials to use the USPS portal and upload citizen data to the portal, all before the midterms."
The appeal
The Justice Department's notice of appeal, filed Friday with the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, sends the case to the 1st Circuit and could return it to the Supreme Court within weeks. The White House calls the postal plan a set of "commonsense measures" aimed at protecting ballot security, and calls Talwani's order "unreasoned and unlawful."
The USPS rule directs states to notify the agency at least 90 days before Nov. 3 if they plan to submit voter data in the new format, and prescribes specific barcodes and envelope templates. Nearly one-third of Americans vote by mail.
Counterpoint
The Washington Examiner reported that USPS's rule enacts new "guardrails on mail-in voting in the name of election security," and that Talwani found Wednesday that the Postal Service defied her Aug. 11 preliminary injunction by publishing the final rule. The Supreme Court on Monday struck an earlier Talwani hold as premature without deciding the merits, leaving open whether the justices will sustain the fresh 14-day block. A 2025 Brookings Institution report found mail-voting fraud occurred in about four cases out of every 10 million mail ballots cast.
Celina Stewart, chief executive of the League of Women Voters, which sued to block the order, said "I'm hoping that federal judges continue to hold the line on their constitutional authority and duty," adding, "The bottom line for voters is, right now, your right to vote has not changed."
The 1st Circuit now takes up the administration's appeal. Talwani has set a Sept. 3 hearing in the underlying case; the first general-election mail ballots are due to be sent Sept. 4.