Supreme Court Refuses to Reinstate Trump's USPS Mail-Ballot Restrictions, 7-2 — Trump Attacks His Own Appointees
On September 14, 2026, the Supreme Court denied the administration's emergency application to lift the block on the USPS mail-ballot rule, keeping the midterms on the existing mail-voting system.1 The unsigned, one-paragraph order did not decide whether the rule is lawful2 — it split 7-2, with Justices Thomas and Alito dissenting. Justice Kavanaugh wrote separately that the rule "might eventually prove lawful" but that applying it now "would still be arbitrary and capricious, he said, because state and local election officials lack enough time to put it in place with the midterms roughly 50 days off." North Carolina and Alabama had already begun mailing ballots when the case reached the justices.
The timeline of the emergency docket: Judge Indira Talwani (D. Mass.) blocked the rule on a 23-state + DC challenge (June 25); SCOTUS briefly let the administration proceed Aug. 24; Talwani issued a narrower 14-day block Aug. 27; the government returned to the Court Sept. 3 and lost. The underlying legality question remains before Judge Talwani.
The notable shift is Trump's response. In a social media post the next morning, he criticized the ruling — saying without evidence it would let Democrats cheat using mail ballots — "He also faulted justices he had appointed, including Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett." Alito, joined by Thomas, dissented on the merits of the stay, writing that the Postal Service holds broad authority to regulate the mail and that officials had made a strong showing the challengers' claim was unlikely to succeed at this stage.
This is the second consecutive emergency-docket loss on election administration (see SAVE Voter-Citizenship Database: Opposition Briefed at SCOTUS as Ruling Looms for the parallel SAVE database fight), and the first time Trump has openly blamed his own three appointees for a ruling3 — a marker for how the Court's election-related restraint is landing with the White House heading into the midterms.
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An instance of Regulatory hurdles and processing delays are weaponized to systematically dismantle mail-in voting. — The latest attempt to weaponize postal processing rules against mail-in voting failed on procedural timing grounds before the election. ↩︎
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An instance of Unsigned emergency orders, not merits rulings, now govern elections and deportation. — The shadow docket settles the operative mail-voting machinery for the midterms without ever touching the underlying legality. ↩︎
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An instance of Institutional independence is now treated as personal betrayal. — Justices ruling against the administration, including his own appointees, are recast as personal betrayers rather than independent institutions. ↩︎