Supreme Court Blocks New Postal Service Rules for Mail Ballots
On September 14, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a Trump administration request to let the Postal Service restrict mail ballots ahead of the November midterm elections.
The case, Postal Service v. California, No. 26A305, asked for a stay. A stay is a court order that lets a rule take effect while lawsuits over it continue. The Court denied that request, so orders blocking the rule stay in place. Supreme Court
The rule would have carried out President Donald Trump's mail-ballot order. According to the Court papers, it required ballot mail to use envelopes with three special features, including an election-mail logo and scannability. Supreme Court The underlying March 2026 executive order told the Postal Service to design new mail-ballot envelopes with special barcodes, told states to provide lists of eligible voters before elections, and gave the agency power to refuse mailed ballots that did not meet the new standards or were not linked to registered voters on state lists. Al Jazeera
Two lower-court judges had blocked the Postal Service rule before Supreme Court review. Reuters A related order on the USPS Final Rule lasted only 14 days and expired on September 10, 2026. The Postal Service told the Court that ballots had already started to be mailed in North Carolina while the injunction remained in place in early September 2026. USPS stay application
The denial means states can continue sending mail ballots as they have for years. Eight states, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Vermont and Washington, plus the District of Columbia allow all elections to be held entirely by mail. Mail ballots account for a third of all votes cast in the United States. Trump himself voted by mail, including in the 2024 election. Al Jazeera
The administration acted after a legislative effort stalled. The SAVE America Act on voting laws passed the House of Representatives in February 2026 and stalled in the Senate. Democrats and activists challenged the mail-voting executive order in several courts. Trump spoke about the issue at the Republican National Midterm Convention in Dallas, Texas on September 9, 2026. Al Jazeera
The broader context here is who controls ballot access. Federal control over mail delivery meets state authority over voter eligibility and ballot distribution. Envelope design, voter-roll transmission and carrier-level checks would move decision-making toward a federal agency in the final weeks of preparation. With North Carolina already mailing ballots and the November election near, the calendar controls what happens next. Any further federal standard would have to get past pre-election purdah principles that discourage late changes, limits on funding, and separate challenges still moving through lower courts.
