President Donald Trump speaks from the Cabinet Room at the White House on Friday, Oct. 17, 2025, in Washington (AP Photo/Alex Brandon).
States cannot “feasibly” carry out the Trump administration’s proposed mail-in voting changes in time for the next midterm elections, a federal judge in Massachusetts ruled Friday.
In her latest ruling in the protracted legal fight over federal efforts to reshape vote-by-mail procedures, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, lifted a temporary restraining order and converted it into a preliminary injunction.
The Trump administration moved quickly in response, filing a notice of appeal with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
In practical terms, however, the immediate impact of both developments is expected to be narrow. Rather than dramatically altering the litigation, Friday night’s actions largely put a more formal structure around a process that was already underway.
Talwani’s decision also broke new ground by concluding that the administration’s final rule conflicts with the statute that created and governs the U.S. Postal Service.
“[T]he Final Rule is inconsistent with the USPS’s governing statute, specifically Congress’s scheme to define categories of ‘nonmailable’ material,” Talwani wrote. “As a starting point, the USPS’s ‘right to exclude letters, or to refuse to permit their delivery to persons addressed, must depend upon some law of Congress, and if no such law exists, then [the USPS] cannot exclude or refuse to deliver them.’”
The judge emphasized that Congress gave the Postal Service only a narrow set of categories it may deem undeliverable. Ballots sent through the mail, she noted, are not included among them.
“Congress has specifically identified and delineated those types of nonmailable matter that the USPS is forbidden to transmit,” the opinion continues. “Nowhere in the nonmailability provisions has Congress evidenced any intent to permit the USPS to establish new nonmailable categories by rulemaking. Congress has not delegated this authority under its Postal Clause power.”
The post Judge says Trump’s federal takeover of mail-in voting is unconstitutional and states cannot ‘feasibly’ comply with proposed rule in time for upcoming midterm elections first appeared on Law & Crime.
