The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has issued a decision upholding the requirement that voters in the state must include accurate dates on the exterior envelopes of their mail-in ballots for their votes to be counted. The split 4-3 ruling overturns a previous decision by the Commonwealth Court, which had halted enforcement of this requirement. The Commonwealth Court had found that the date requirement was unconstitutional when enforced against voters who submitted their ballots by the deadline.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court determined that the Commonwealth Court did not have authority to review this case because all 67 county election boards were not included as defendants. Including only Al Schmidt, the secretary of the Commonwealth, as a defendant was insufficient for giving jurisdiction to decide on this matter.
Furthermore, the high court rejected a request by plaintiffs to use extraordinary jurisdiction powers that would allow them to take over cases from lower courts when there is significant public interest or an urgent issue needing immediate resolution.
In dissenting statements, Justice David Wecht argued that instead of vacating the lower court’s decision on technical grounds, they should have ruled on the constitutional question presented in this appeal. Wecht emphasized that settling whether Pennsylvania’s mail-ballot date requirement violates constitutional provisions ahead of November’s presidential election is crucial.
This case was brought forward by nine advocacy groups challenging the legality of enforcing date requirements for mail-in ballots. They argued it violated provisions for “free and equal” elections in Pennsylvania’s Constitution. Initially, they won in favor of suspending enforcement in two key counties—Philadelphia and Allegheny—but now with this reversal from Pennsylvania Supreme Court, mail-in ballots with date errors can be invalidated.
The ACLU estimated that tens of thousands of eligible voters have been disqualified due to handwritten date errors under this rule. A request for comment on whether ACLU intends to appeal this decision has not been returned yet.
Chairman Michael Whatley and co-chair Lara Trump from Republican National Committee praised this ruling as a win for election integrity and voter confidence in Pennsylvania. On another note, Democratic National Committee argued against these requirements stating they serve no state interest and deny qualified Pennsylvanians their right to vote.
This ruling highlights ongoing tensions between election integrity measures and voting access leading up to next year’s election.
