A federal judge in Boston on Thursday blocked the Trump administration's plan to deny mail-in ballots to states that would not provide their voter rolls to federal officials. U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani ruled that provisions of an executive order issued by Donald Trump on March 31, requiring the Postal Service to implement a barcode tracking system for ballot envelopes linked to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services data, were unconstitutional.
Executive order challenged by voting rights groups
The ruling comes amid a broader push by President Trump and his administration to reshape voting rules ahead of November's midterm elections. Trump is urging Congress to pass the Save America Act, which would impose new voter ID requirements and curtail mail-in voting. Voting rights groups, joined by 23 states and the District of Columbia, sued to stop the proposed rule, arguing the Constitution gives the president no authority to govern election administration.
Democratic senators echoed this point on Wednesday during a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing, where they questioned Postmaster General David Steiner about the legality of the policy. Senator Gary Peters of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the committee, stated, "It is clear there is nowhere in the Constitution and no federal law that the Postal Service is authorized to create these types of voter databases, verification systems or mandatory standards. It simply does not exist."
Proposed changes and legal implications
Steiner responded, "I would think that states would want the information to ensure that the ballots that they think they're sending out are the ballots that are actually getting sent out." On Wednesday, as Steiner testified, Postal Service officials issued a public notice of rule-making outlining proposed changes. State election officials would have been required to submit a voter manifest—including names, addresses, and individual barcode identifiers—to a new "USPS federal ballot mail portal" at least 30 days before an election. USPS would then physically verify outgoing mail-in ballots against this database. Any ballots addressed to individuals not on the submitted lists, or envelopes lacking the mandated federal serialization and barcode tracking, would be rejected and returned.
Judge Talwani's injunction clarified that it "does not bar the federal government from providing assistance with verifying the citizenship or eligibility of any voter if the assistance is provided at the request of any State and within the framework provided by Congress." However, it blocks the administration from "taking any steps to create a new federal program to superintend and control Plaintiff States' maintenance of their voter rolls; or initiating any investigation or prosecution of Plaintiff States, their officials, local officials, or agents of such state or local officials involved in the administration of federal elections within Plaintiff States."
Impact on upcoming elections
The decision is a significant setback for the Trump administration's efforts to tighten voting rules before the midterms. Voting rights advocates hailed the ruling as a victory for election integrity and state autonomy. The case underscores ongoing legal battles over voting access and federal overreach, with implications for how mail-in ballots are handled in future elections.
