The Supreme Court on Monday rejected President Donald Trump’s controversial plan to change how mail ballots are sent to voters across the country, rebuffing a proposal that election officials warned would have had catastrophic consequences if allowed to take effect for this year’s midterms.
Maybe it’s just my distrust of the whole thing, but I wouldn’t put it past them to do this just for plausible deniability, while the post office still rejects everything they can in accordance to trump’s wishes… That way people will trust mail in voting, and end up with their votes rejected anyway. They get exactly what they want while still giving some illusion of fairness.
Then, after the elections they’ll just say whoops! USPS shouldn’t have done that, and nothing will happen.
Edit: on another article about this…
Alito wrote in his dissent that the Postal Service “has broad authority to regulate the mail” and likely does have the power to enforce Trump’s restrictions.
I wish that I’m wrong, but the USPS have already been messing with mail in votes on trump’s orders…
Trump signed an executive order in March that gave the USPS an unprecedented role in screening states’ mail ballot programs. Election officials have already expressed deep concerns about having to use a system that has not gone through extensive testing and training procedures
The agency will not deliver ballots for states if there are any discrepancies between the voter information in the USPS system and what’s picked up by agency scanners on the envelopes of the ballots.
first it was dejoy trying to destroy the mail sorters, and then limiting OT for USPS, but he then just stopped doing anything during BIDEN’s presidency, kinda wierd he dint act at all. until he was replaced.
They want to give us the impression of a “big victory” so that we’ll forget about the Voting Rights Act overturning and all the last minute redistricting that is still in play.
i.e. they want this to be last big election ruling we remember so that we’ll all look back and say “wuh wuh I guess they won fair and square because we won that case so muh muh”
Roberts, Barrett, and Gorsuch appear to actually stand up for federalism. They might actually think the postal rule is illegal because it usurps power reserved to the states.
Kavanaugh thinks the rule is probably legal, but it’s too close to the election to implement.
Alito and Thomas dissented. They think the rule should go into effect now.
The Appeal to Heaven Flag has been used by Christian nationalists in the United States since 2013. The origins of the Appeal to Heaven flag as an emblem of the Christian nationalist movement in the United States trace to 2013, when Pentecostal cleric Dutch Sheets received the flag as a gift and prophesied that it would be the “symbol of a campaign to restore America to the Christian nation God intended.” The flag was given to governor of Alaska Sarah Palin, who advocated for the Appeal to Heaven Flag to be flown “over courthouses and statehouses.” In the 2020s, the flag was flown at events attended by various Christian right and far-right groups including a Christian nationalist strand of Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” movement. In particular, the flag was carried by several of the US Capitol rioters on January 6, 2021.
Remember, trump only knows a ridiculous bully bulldozer negotiation style - “I’m suing you for 11 trillion dollars!!!”
That’s ridiculous, so it all goes on circular fighting for months/years, eventually they settle for $17 million in a “big loss” for trump when he shouldn’t have even had a penny in the first place.
In this case, the damage is already done at USPS and beyond.
The predominate ballot machine company was just recently purchased by trump loyalists
Biden was blocked on procedure but didn’t take extreme measures to remove dejoy from USPS or to halt or reverse the damage he did.
Musk manipulated votes in multiple ways, he now has more money and more criminal liability this time around… So he’ll probably just sit this one out?
flock cameras are watching you vote this time, scanning your face/plates, linked to a profile with your “estimated threat level” and deploying the limited number of brown shirts they have to most “efficient” areas where “they” are gathering based on flock cross referenced with exit polls and historical turnout for registered voters at a given polling place.
ice agents may or may not disrupt polls directly, though the threat alone will keep many voters away. Though they may avoid direct voter intimidation beyond a couple early performative shows, they may just cause strategic disruptions NEAR real time targeted key polling places (see above point) and disrupt common car/bus travel routes
all the above in coordination with news/media and social media companies owned and run by complicit oligarchs with incentive to tell the story the other fascists need told.
and a now mature cult, pardoned from consequences of a prior failed coup, likely impatiently waiting for another story of national violence to help them unite as perceived victims or bask in the glow of a “victorious” violent act for “their team”.
So scotus does this with nothing to lose. Grandmas in Ohio then trust and defend the validity of voting and believe that checks and balances still in place to supervise an “overzealous” trump. They then refer back to this after the manipulated election to come - “Look! These liberals are never happy? The supreme court denied changes that we still should have had but didn’t need, and they still lost, while cheating, and they can’t accept it” and then broken scotus says your right actually and they rule the other way leading up to '28.
Don’t despair yet, though. Orban was just as criminal as Trump and he was still voted out. People opposed showed up in such numbers that even his cheating couldn’t overcome the will of the voters.
Americans just need to understand the stakes (as you clearly do). Losing your job because you skipped work to vote is terrible, but still better than a liferime under Trump and his ilk.
They save him from the most blatantly, stupidly obvious unconstitutional things he tries to do so there’s a faint gossamer of legitimacy left on the 90% of his bullshit that they find some weak-ass excuse to let through. This makes it more likely that they can lock in and perpetuate the more systemic aspects of his grasping for power.
Cynically? After the elections are held, Trump and the Republicans are going to challenge every single Democrat headed for office, and SCROTUS will uphold enough of those challenges for the Republicans to keep control (like they did in Bush v Gore). They’ll point back to these rulings as evidence of their impartiality.
Ehhh they’re only 90% corrupt. On most issues it’s hard to tell because the line is so far from normal liberal politics but it is there. They want the right-wing oligarchy but not a full on dictatorship. They have been pretty consistent and not letting him go full Mussolini even though they’ll allow most kinds of fuckery.
Except Thomas and Alito. Those two are full on fascists.
At this point, considering what they’ve enabled, my reaction is “there must be a gotcha in there somewhere”. That, or it’s as simple as them realizing they were moving the needle too far and too fast, and are pumping the brakes a bit, if only for appearances.
I’m kind of irretrievably jaded on the integrity of pretty much any branch of our government at this point.
I’m honestly unsure if there will even be elections in 2028. And even if there is, we all fucking saw what they tried to do on J6, and I clock it at a roughly 100% chance they’ll try the same shit again.
At any rate, the manner in which the midterms pan out (and I mean “whether the fascists find some idiotic legal fig leaf to use as a basis for excluding anyone but their own party from the national legislature” and “whether the electoral numbers going to be systematically fucked with”, in addition to “what the voting outcome is”) is going to be extremely telling.
The problem is the USPS “will not deliver ballots for states if there are any discrepancies between the voter information in the USPS system and what’s picked up by agency scanners on the envelopes of the ballots.”
They make good rulings all the time. It’s just usually when doing the right thing also happens to align with the court’s own interests. I can count on John Roberts to support his own interests, if nothing else. And it is not in the best interest of SCOTUS judges for the presidency to become a full dictatorship. If that happens, they lose all their power as well. They support a powerful presidency because a powerful presidency is the only way to push through unpopular social conservative policies. But they don’t want a full dictatorship either.
its the classict tactic of the gop, have enough of the support(of your parties goals) so you can pretend to vote the opposite. except this is slightly reversed, they can feign they were fighting “fraud”
Their whole thing does have the common theme of decentralizing and throwing as much as possible back to the states. Which includes funding.
Long game it does set it up for oligarchs (even more so) while projecting an impression of leaving the republic or whatever intact.
In addition to what you all are saying about not being so blatant about creating your own voter fraud.
That said, I can’t imagine there not being individual bad players peppered throughout the postal service. Use your drop boxes and not the mail box for returns.
probably would hurt maga areas too? unless they plan on preferentially ignoring “discripencies, in red counties” then it would just cause another mess.
I can’t believe it. I honestly believe that the SC is fully corrupt and morally compromised. What is their angle?
Maybe it’s just my distrust of the whole thing, but I wouldn’t put it past them to do this just for plausible deniability, while the post office still rejects everything they can in accordance to trump’s wishes… That way people will trust mail in voting, and end up with their votes rejected anyway. They get exactly what they want while still giving some illusion of fairness.
Then, after the elections they’ll just say whoops! USPS shouldn’t have done that, and nothing will happen.
Edit: on another article about this…
So ya. It’s a trap.
I think this is the most accurate answer.
I wish that I’m wrong, but the USPS have already been messing with mail in votes on trump’s orders…
https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/01/politics/usps-whistleblower-mail-ballot-rules-trump
Also, the turnip appointed postmaster D. Steiner has stated that if a state refuses to give the Trump administration their voter lists under Trump’s Executive Order 14399, the Postal Service will not mail their ballots https://abcnews.com/Politics/postal-service-deliver-ballots-states-refuse-turn-voter/story?id=134185698
They are absolutely rigging everything they can to gain an edge.
first it was dejoy trying to destroy the mail sorters, and then limiting OT for USPS, but he then just stopped doing anything during BIDEN’s presidency, kinda wierd he dint act at all. until he was replaced.
They want to give us the impression of a “big victory” so that we’ll forget about the Voting Rights Act overturning and all the last minute redistricting that is still in play.
i.e. they want this to be last big election ruling we remember so that we’ll all look back and say “wuh wuh I guess they won fair and square because we won that case so muh muh”
That … makes sense.
Roberts, Barrett, and Gorsuch appear to actually stand up for federalism. They might actually think the postal rule is illegal because it usurps power reserved to the states.
Kavanaugh thinks the rule is probably legal, but it’s too close to the election to implement.
Alito and Thomas dissented. They think the rule should go into effect now.
Supreme Court case that supreme court justices should not be executed right now: Alito and Thomas dissented.
Alito flew this flag at his vacation home
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Tree_Flag
https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/31/us/appeal-to-heaven-flag-meaning-cec
On top of everything else, gosh thats a shitty-looking flag.
Are you aware that the Alito and Thomas dissent is full of false claims about the yuge amount of election fraud in the country?
On this case they’re voting with the president against our democracy.
Yeah, I’m just making a round about way of saying I’m not surprised; they dissent on everything that should be a no brainier
i think thats the only reason, too close to election. it will hurt Maga counties as much as dem ones if they allowed it now.
Plausible deniability.
Remember, trump only knows a ridiculous bully bulldozer negotiation style - “I’m suing you for 11 trillion dollars!!!”
That’s ridiculous, so it all goes on circular fighting for months/years, eventually they settle for $17 million in a “big loss” for trump when he shouldn’t have even had a penny in the first place.
In this case, the damage is already done at USPS and beyond.
So scotus does this with nothing to lose. Grandmas in Ohio then trust and defend the validity of voting and believe that checks and balances still in place to supervise an “overzealous” trump. They then refer back to this after the manipulated election to come - “Look! These liberals are never happy? The supreme court denied changes that we still should have had but didn’t need, and they still lost, while cheating, and they can’t accept it” and then broken scotus says your right actually and they rule the other way leading up to '28.
If we are still a country then.
The state of US democracy is dire.
Don’t despair yet, though. Orban was just as criminal as Trump and he was still voted out. People opposed showed up in such numbers that even his cheating couldn’t overcome the will of the voters.
Americans just need to understand the stakes (as you clearly do). Losing your job because you skipped work to vote is terrible, but still better than a liferime under Trump and his ilk.
They save him from the most blatantly, stupidly obvious unconstitutional things he tries to do so there’s a faint gossamer of legitimacy left on the 90% of his bullshit that they find some weak-ass excuse to let through. This makes it more likely that they can lock in and perpetuate the more systemic aspects of his grasping for power.
Cynically? After the elections are held, Trump and the Republicans are going to challenge every single Democrat headed for office, and SCROTUS will uphold enough of those challenges for the Republicans to keep control (like they did in Bush v Gore). They’ll point back to these rulings as evidence of their impartiality.
Reason 5 million why the midterms have to be too big to rig.
Ehhh they’re only 90% corrupt. On most issues it’s hard to tell because the line is so far from normal liberal politics but it is there. They want the right-wing oligarchy but not a full on dictatorship. They have been pretty consistent and not letting him go full Mussolini even though they’ll allow most kinds of fuckery.
Except Thomas and Alito. Those two are full on fascists.
Did you want them to support disallowimg mail in ballots? I see this as a good ruling for democracy.
At this point, considering what they’ve enabled, my reaction is “there must be a gotcha in there somewhere”. That, or it’s as simple as them realizing they were moving the needle too far and too fast, and are pumping the brakes a bit, if only for appearances.
I’m kind of irretrievably jaded on the integrity of pretty much any branch of our government at this point.
I was thinking the same thing. Very possible mailin will be disallowed for 2028.
I’m honestly unsure if there will even be elections in 2028. And even if there is, we all fucking saw what they tried to do on J6, and I clock it at a roughly 100% chance they’ll try the same shit again.
At any rate, the manner in which the midterms pan out (and I mean “whether the fascists find some idiotic legal fig leaf to use as a basis for excluding anyone but their own party from the national legislature” and “whether the electoral numbers going to be systematically fucked with”, in addition to “what the voting outcome is”) is going to be extremely telling.
The problem is the USPS “will not deliver ballots for states if there are any discrepancies between the voter information in the USPS system and what’s picked up by agency scanners on the envelopes of the ballots.”
So the USPS, run by a trump appointee, gets to screen your ballot according to the info the trump admin gives them. That does not sound good at all imo. https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/01/politics/usps-whistleblower-mail-ballot-rules-trump
That’s what I mean. When was the last time this court made a good ruling. Weird.
They make good rulings all the time. It’s just usually when doing the right thing also happens to align with the court’s own interests. I can count on John Roberts to support his own interests, if nothing else. And it is not in the best interest of SCOTUS judges for the presidency to become a full dictatorship. If that happens, they lose all their power as well. They support a powerful presidency because a powerful presidency is the only way to push through unpopular social conservative policies. But they don’t want a full dictatorship either.
I hadn’t thought of that. They would be ruling themselves into irrelevance.
The ruling was definitely surprising.
Why would someone saying they can’t believe it make you ask if they think it’s a bad decision?
I asked for clarification. I prefer that over making an assumption.
deleted by creator
The usual suspects dissented
its the classict tactic of the gop, have enough of the support(of your parties goals) so you can pretend to vote the opposite. except this is slightly reversed, they can feign they were fighting “fraud”
Their whole thing does have the common theme of decentralizing and throwing as much as possible back to the states. Which includes funding.
Long game it does set it up for oligarchs (even more so) while projecting an impression of leaving the republic or whatever intact.
In addition to what you all are saying about not being so blatant about creating your own voter fraud.
That said, I can’t imagine there not being individual bad players peppered throughout the postal service. Use your drop boxes and not the mail box for returns.
They’ve not received their payment
They can get their powers removed if they sway the voting population too far against them.
In an ideal world perhaps, but that world is very far from us right now. They really don’t care what you or I think.
probably would hurt maga areas too? unless they plan on preferentially ignoring “discripencies, in red counties” then it would just cause another mess.