Sullivan’s order stems from a lawsuit the NAACP originally brought against the Postal Service in 2020 because of policy changes that slowed mail delivery as the pandemic election was approaching. A 2021 settlement required the agency to publish guidance documents detailing how it would prioritize “the monitoring and timely delivery of Election Mail.” Part of the settlement gave the court authority to oversee USPS’ actions on this issue.
Sullivan wrote in the Wednesday opinion that, under the agency’s proposed regulations for implementing the Trump executive order, ballots would not be delivered to voters if those ballots were not compliant with the executive order’s requirements.
“The Proposed Rule violates paragraph 2 of the Agreement because the Postal Service cannot post documents reflecting ‘practices and policies for prioritizing the monitoring and timely delivery of Election Mail’ if its policies provide that it will not accept ‘noncompliant mailing’ and therefore will not deliver mail-in or absentee ballots to some voters, and if it will not mail ballots to any voters in a state where the state ‘declines or fails to certify a list,’” Sullivan said.
Trump’s order would also require that mail ballot envelopes have individualized barcodes for automated tracking. That policy is seen as a best practice for election administration but one that many jurisdictions would face challenges in implementing, because of the cost of such a change.
It also directs the Department of Homeland Security to draw from federal databases to assemble lists of voting age citizens in each state, stoking fears that the lists will be used for overly aggressive voter purges.
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