Nicholas Riccardi and Michael Casey, The Associated PressSeptember 03, 2026<\/p>\n
A federal judge in Boston will hear arguments Thursday on whether to\u00a0extend her prohibition<\/a>\u00a0against the U.S. Postal Service requiring states to use a new mail balloting system for the midterms as part of\u00a0an executive order<\/a>\u00a0by President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n The hearing in the closely watched case comes the day before the first state begins sending mail ballots to voters.<\/p>\n U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani is considering whether to order a preliminary injunction that would bar the Postal Service from requiring the new system to be used for the midterms. Last week, she imposed a 14-day\u00a0temporary restraining order<\/a>\u00a0to keep it from being used. That order expires next week as more states begin sending out mail ballots.<\/p>\n Talwani has been here before. In June, she\u00a0prohibited the administration<\/a>\u00a0from trying to implement Trump’s order for the November election, ruling the changes came too close to the election for the federal government to embark on such a project. But the\u00a0Supreme Court<\/a>\u00a0late last month ruled that Talwani’s order was premature because the Postal Service had not yet published regulations governing how it would apply Trump’s order.\u00a0The agency did so<\/a>\u00a0just before the high court ruling came down, prompting Democrats and voting rights groups to swiftly re-file their lawsuits.<\/p>\n They counter that the president has no authority to set election rules, which is a power designated in the Constitution to the states and in some cases Congress.<\/p>\n They won an initial victory with Talwani’s restraining order, which has already been\u00a0appealed by the administration<\/a>. It’s likely the case will again end up before the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n Trump has\u00a0long opposed mail voting<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0falsely blamed it<\/a>\u00a0for his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden, even though he often\u00a0uses that method<\/a>\u00a0to cast his own ballot.<\/p>\n Election officials say there’s simply no way they can comply with the Postal Service directives, which could require a complete overhaul of their operations. Before it delivers mail ballots for any state, the Postal Service would have to approve the design of the envelopes that contain them and have the state upload a list of voters receiving them to\u00a0an online portal<\/a>.<\/p>\n Some ballots have already gone out. A few municipalities in Wisconsin opted to send mail ballots to voters earlier this week, but Friday marks the full kickoff of voting as North Carolina starts shipping its mail ballots to all voters who requested them.<\/p>\n The administration has contended the changes are relatively minor and legal. But the portal was still not active this week, and most election offices have already printed their envelopes and ballots.<\/p>\n