Federal Judge Halts Trump Administration Plans To Change Postal Service Processing of Ballots
WASHINGTON D.C. (KEYT) – A federal judge has blocked the Trump Administration's plans to take over mail-based voting nationwide by changing how the Postal Service processes ballots Wednesday finding the federal government's arguments "without merit".
U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan granted a motion filed by the National Associations for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) to force the Postal Service to comply with a 2021 settlement agreement between the organizations that requires the federal agency to "prioritize monitoring and timely delivery of election mail".
"Upon careful consideration of NAACP's motion, the opposition, the reply, the applicable law, and for the reasons discussed below, the Court GRANTS NAACP’s motion," wrote U.S. District Judge Sullivan in his decision Wednesday. "[T]he Proposed Rule would violate Paragraph 2 of the [2021 Settlement] Agreement because the Postal Service 'would refuse to transmit mail-in ballots in states that did not use specific envelopes with specific codes, and would refuse to deliver ballots for voters not included on a state-specific Mail-In and Absentee Participation List.'"
On June 2, the U.S. Postal Service published a proposal to amend the Mailing Standards of the United States Postal Service, Domestic Mail Manual to add a section creating a federal registry of approved voters and requiring states to notify the federal agency of every voter who receives a mail-in ballot.
The changes were intended to comply with Executive Order 14399 issued by President Trump on March 31 of this year shared the U.S. Postal Service.
"This provision will help determine adherence to federal law and facilitate law enforcement efforts," the Postal Service argued. "[T]he provided lists will evidence how many ballots have been mailed, and allow law enforcement officials to compare the total number of mailed ballots to the total number of received ballots to detect potential issues meriting further investigation. This is accomplished by ensuring that individuals who receive a mail-in or absentee ballot are included on the State-Specific Participation Lists [created by the U.S. Postal Service]."
When asked directly if the U.S. Postal Service would not deliver ballots to voters in states that did not comply with the unprecedented changes to ballot processing, Postmaster General David Steiner told the Senate Homeland Security Committee on June 24 that the U.S. Postal Service would no longer deliver ballots to states that did not comply with the proposed rule.
States including California, Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, and Vermont all conduct general elections through universal vote-by-mail systems.
Notably, Article I, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution states that decisions regarding, "the times, places, and manner of holding Elections" are delegated to Congress and managed by each state.
It does not mention any executive branch position, office, department or agency.
"President Trump issued his Executive Order [14399] directing USPS [U.S. Postal Service] to issue a rule to establish compulsory specifications for election mail and create a master absentee voter list of millions of American voters – with the power to refuse to deliver their ballots," noted a letter signed by 47 Senators addressed to the Postal Service's Postmaster General and members of its Board of Governors last week. "The Order is a blatant violation of the Constitution, which vests the authority to regulate the time, place, and manner of federal elections with the states, subject to alterations made by Congress."
In April of this year, California Attorney General Rob Bonta joined a coalition of 23 other attorneys general filing for a summary judgement in their legal challenge to the Trump Administration's unprecedented attempt to federalize elections.
The proposed changes to mail-based elections appears to be an attempt to implement Executive Order 14399 after its was directly blocked in federal court argued the Senate members in their letter last week.
"The proposed rule USPS issued on June 2 suffers from all the same legal deficiencies of the Executive Order [14399] and cannot be lawfully implemented. The proposed rule would illegally condition a state's exercise of its constitutional authority to utilize mail-in ballots on submitting its complete absentee voter rolls to USPS and complying with USPS mandatory election mail specifications. Specifically, the proposal requires any state that permits votes to be cast by mail to submit to USPS each absentee or mail-in voter's name, address, and their unique Intelligent Mail Barcode. The regulation purports to permit only states to control which of their voters are enrolled on the new master list, but this new and unnecessary master list of American voters would then be controlled by USPS and ultimately President Trump."
While that coalition of state prosecutors prevailed in federal court on behalf of their respective states and a federal judge permanently blocked key parts of the Trump Administration's attempt to take over elections nationwide through its latest elections-focused executive order, Wednesday's ruling ensures that those proposed changes now apply to Post Offices nationwide ahead of November's election.
"This ruling [by U.S. District Judge Sullivan Wednesday] is a critical step in protecting the rights of voters who rely on the timely delivery of mail-in ballots to participate in our democracy," explained Quiana-Joy Ochiagha, Assistant General Counsel, NAACP. "The proposed USPS changes would have created unnecessary and unlawful barriers, in direct violation of the USPS's mandate to prioritize election mail Those barriers could have disproportionately harmed Black voters, who are more likely to rely on mail voting due to longstanding inequities in access. Put simply, the use of mail-in voting helps reduce voter intimidation at the polls and election day dirty tricks. This decision makes clear that access to the ballot cannot be tied to arbitrary requirements. The NAACP will continue to hold this government accountable when it attempts to undermine fair and equal access to the electoral process."
Back in 2020, partially in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Postal Service implemented changes that resulted in widespread delays in election mail processing shared the NAACP in its initial motion filed in early June of this year.
Eventually, the advocacy organization was able to secure a settlement agreement in December of 2021, that required the Postal Service to provide reports on mail delivery service compliance months before each national primary and general election through 2028, as well as weekly reports during the six weeks before any general election.
"Plaintiff [NAACP] is unaware of any point in USPS's history in which it chose not to deliver properly addressed, stamped, lawful, nonhazardous mail from a government entity," argued the NAACP in its motion filed in early June. "[C]ontrary to its obligation under the [2021 Settlement] Agreement, rather than taking 'Extraordinary Measures' to ensure timely processing of mailed ballots, USPS is promising unprecedented measures to prevent such processing. The result of the new procedures will inevitably be disenfranchisement of large numbers of qualified voters."
According to Wednesday's decision, the Postal Service argued that Paragraph 2 of the 2021 settlement agreement is only a "informational obligation for USPS to publicly post practices and policies" and that the requirement to prioritize the delivery of election mail would not be violated by the proposed changes.
"The Postal Service's arguments are without merit," stated U.S. District Judge Sullivan in his decision Wednesday. "The Proposed Rule violates paragraph 2 of the [2021 Settlement] 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 mailings' 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.'"
The Postal Service further argued that because the rule changes were merely a proposal, the court had no authority to rule on whether the changes would violate the 2021 settlement agreement.
"[T]he Postal Service has not explained—nor provided authority for—why the Court cannot declare that the standards and procedures set forth in the Proposed Rule would violate the Agreement and enjoin the Postal Service from implementing the standards and procedures," expalined U.S. District Judge Sullivan.
"NAACP has plausibly suggested—and the Postal Service has not disputed—that the Proposed Rule is already having a 'real impact on present day affairs'," U.S. District Judge Sullivan detailed before noting that the federal agency has already issued its 2026-2027 Official Election Mail Guide in February of this year and that the proposed changes have resulted in confusion and apprehension already as other court cases have cited.
The 2021 Settlement Agreement does require that the NAACP reach out in writing to the U.S. Postal Service at least five days before filing any suit alleging a violation of the 2021 settlement agreement, something the federal agency argued had not happened.
"The Postal Service argues that the Court is without jurisdiction to consider the motion because NAACP did not comply with this requirement when it did not wait at least five days after the Proposed Rule was published in the Federal Register on June 2, 2026 before filing the instant motion," explained U.S. District Judge Sullivan in Wednesday's decision.
Instead, the NAACP reached out to the U.S. Postal Service proactively based on the policies described in an executive order issued in late March of this year.
Executive Order 14399, Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections attempted to unilaterally make sweeping changes to national elections in the following ways:
- Tasked the Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and the Commissioner of the Social Security Administration to create a list of voters using federal databases and transmit that voter list to elections officials in each state at least 60 days before any federal election
- Directed the Postmaster General of the U.S. Postal Service to develop lists of voters enrolled with the federal agency for mail-in voting and coordinate with the Department of Justice to investigate any use of mailed elections materials outside of federally authorized mail-in voting
- Ordered the Attorney General of the United States to take all lawful steps to stop non-compliance with the new elections rules and required states and localities to preserve all records of voter participation in any federal election for five years
Judge Sullivan noted that the NAACP had reached out to the U.S. Postal Service the first business day after Executive Order 14399 was issued, 62 days before filing their legal motion.
"On April 2, 2026, the first business day after the EO [Executive Order 14399] was issued and sixty-two days before filing the motion, NAACP wrote to the Postal Service to inform it that the rulemaking directed by the EO would cause it to violate the Agreement," noted the federal judge. "The Postal Service acknowledged receipt on the same day and not having received a response, NAACP sent a follow up on April 8, 2026...The Postal Service responded on April 14, 2026, stating that paragraph 10 [of the 2021 settlement agreement] was not implicated because '[i]t is . . . premature to know what final rule will emerge from the notice-and-comment process, including how any such rule would implicate existing legal authorities'."
In other words, the U.S. Postal Service argued that Executive Order 14399 did not violate the 2021 settlement agreement that required the timely delivery and processing of election mail because it had not been fully implemented despite its publicly-stated and direct attempts to fundamentally alter mail-based voting nationally.
"Sixty-two days before filing the motion, NAACP wrote to the Postal Service to inform it that the rulemaking directed by the EO [Executive Order 14399] would cause the Postal Service to violate the Agreement and the Postal Service declined to substantively engage with NAACP on the issue. The Proposed Rule was issued pursuant to the EO and incorporates the requirements set forth in the EO.
It would be difficult to separate the voting-specific executive order issued in March from the changes proposed by the U.S. Postal Service in early June beyond matching their policy plans.
The proposed changes to the Domestic Mail Manual detailed on the Federal Register published on June 2, states that the sweeping changes to mail-based voting were intended to be, "consistent with Section 3 of Executive Order 14399, Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections."
Additionally, the "Background" section of the Federal Register input regarding the rule changes begins by stating, "On March 31, 2026, the President issued Executive Order 14399, Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections,91 FR 17125 (2026) ('Order'). The Executive Order discusses the importance of additional measures concerning the use of the mails to vote in federal elections, in order to facilitate enforcement of federal law, reduce the risk of fraud, and help protect the integrity of federal elections. Following the issuance of the Order, the Postal Service submitted this proposed rule to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for interagency review. Subsequent to that review process, the Postal Service issues this proposed rule regarding the preparation of ballot mail for federal elections to facilitate the enforcement of federal law. The proposed rule would also implement best practices for Postal Service operations regarding ballot mail."
Your News Channel reached out to the regional office for the U.S. Postal Service multiple times and its response to our inquiries will be added to this article when it is received.
This was also is not the first attempt to assert executive branch authority over elections without Congressional input during President Trump's second term.
On March 25 of last year, President Trump issued Executive Order No. 14248 which was met with a different lawsuit filed by a coalition of Attorneys General.
The group of state prosecutors secured a preliminary injunction and a motion by the Trump Administration to dismiss that lawsuit was denied by a federal judge in District Court in Massachusetts.
"[T]here is no evidence in this record of widespread 'illegal voting, discrimination, fraud, and other forms of malfeasance and error' [a quote from Executive Order 14248] within American elections, which the Executive Order purports to safeguard against," noted U.S. District Judge Denise Casper in Wednesday's ruling. "[C]onsidering the States' undisputed record of harm resulting from the Challenged Provisions of the Executive Order against Defendants' lack thereof, the balance of equities weighs in favor of granting the States permanent injunctive relief."
In addition to those election-specific executive orders, the Department of Justice sent formal requests to over 40 states for copies of their respective voter lists and multiple states including California, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, New Hampshire, Oregon, and Pennsylvania were sued by the federal government to force them to turn over their voter lists.
As of June 29, federal courts have blocked all eleven suits filed by the Trump Administration to force unprecedented access to voter information.
Over a quarter of the U.S. Senate signed a letter demanding an end to the Department of Justice's nationwide pursuit of private voter information.
Federal law does require states to maintain accurate voter rolls and allows people in most states to register to vote at their Department of Motor Vehicles, but does not authorize the Department of Justice to participate in that maintenance.
In January of this year, when a federal judge dismissed the U.S. Department of Justice's lawsuit seeking access to Californian's private voter information, he characterized the attempt as, "unprecedented and illegal".
"The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) seeks an unprecedented amount of personal information related to California voters from California's unredacted voting rolls. The requested information includes the names, social security numbers, home addresses, voting history and other sensitive information of nearly 23 million Californians," wrote Federal District Judge David O. Carter in January's decision to dismiss the Justice Department's lawsuit. "The Department of Justice seeks to use civil rights legislation which was enacted for an entirely different purpose to amass and retain an unprecedented amount of confidential voter data. This effort goes far beyond what Congress intended when it passed the underlying legislation. The centralization of this information by the federal government would have a chilling effect on voter registration which would inevitably lead to decreasing voter turnout as voters fear that their information is being used for some inappropriate or unlawful purpose. This risk threatens the right to vote which is the cornerstone of American democracy."
"The government's request is unprecedented and illegal," Judge Carter concluded.
