Donald Trump notched a significant win ahead of the midterm elections after the Supreme Court backed the White House in a dispute over the president’s executive order targeting mail-in voting.
The ruling, however, does not end the legal fight. It leaves the door open for fresh challenges that could delay the administration’s plans, while several related lawsuits are already moving through the courts.
The U.S. Postal Service outlined last week how it would carry out the order, but the calendar is tightening fast. Some states are expected to begin mailing ballots to voters within weeks, leaving little time for sweeping operational changes.
The court’s conservative majority did not rule on whether Trump’s order itself is legal. Instead, the justices concluded that the states involved in the case lacked the legal standing to bring the challenge.
‘The Court´s disposition of this application does not mean that any measure taken by the Government to implement the Order will necessarily be lawful. On that score, time will tell,’ the majority wrote in an unsigned order.
All three of the Supreme Court’s liberal-leaning justices dissented from the decision.
Mail-in voting has been a frequent target of Trump, who has repeatedly alleged that the practice leads to widespread fraud, despite substantial evidence to the contrary and his own past use of absentee voting.
The Daily Mail has contacted the White House for comment.
Donald Trump scored a massive victory ahead of the midterms as the Supreme Court sided with the White House in a case that questioned the President’s executive order over mail-in voting
The case could be one of multiple voting-related challenges before the justices.
The Justice Department had filed an emergency appeal asking the high court to allow work on implementing the changes before the midterms.
Trump’s executive order, signed in March, calls on his administration to create lists of eligible voters and orders the US Postal Service to deliver mail ballots only to people on those lists.
Democratic officials in 23 states and the District of Columbia sued to block the order.
They argued that the Constitution gives states and Congress the power to run elections, and Trump´s changes could lead to chaos and partisan abuse.
‘The consequences of allowing such transformative changes to take effect so close to this fall´s elections would be extreme,’ attorneys for the states wrote.
Dozens of state and local election officials weighed in, asking the justices to leave the order frozen while election preparations are already underway.
A judge in Massachusetts blocked the plan for the midterm elections in those states. An appeals court upheld her decision.
She later granted a second order blocking it nationwide , another potential stumbling block for Trump administration plan.
The Justice Department appealed to the Supreme Court on procedural grounds in late July, arguing that the states sued too soon.
They also pointed to another ruling out of Washington, where a judge allowed Trump’s order to proceed.
An appeals court backed that decision, while still leaving room for future court action if the changes are implemented.
Federal attorneys argued that the Massachusetts order ‘blocks the government´s ability to finalize and implement the President´s proposed policies to promote election integrity for the upcoming federal elections in November.’
A dozen Republican-leaning states supported the federal government in their own appeal before the high court, saying states would have input on the final voter lists.
The Supreme Court has previously ruled against Trump-backed arguments on mail-in ballots, finding in June that states can count ballots that arrive after Election Day.
That case was decided after full briefing and arguments, rather than on the court´s emergency docket.
Trump has blamed mail voting – without credible evidence – for his loss to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020.
He has promoted the proposed changes in his executive order as safeguards to keep non-US citizens from voting.
He´s also repeatedly pressed for the passage of the legislation that requires proof of citizenship to vote.
Noncitizen voting has been shown to be rare, and is a felony that can be punishable by deportation.
Using mail ballots has become increasingly popular with voters of both parties, with about 30 percent of all ballots cast that way during the 2024 presidential election, according to federal data. The process also is secure.
A 2025 Brookings Institution study found only about four cases of fraud out of every 10 million mail ballots cast.
This is a developing story.
