Archives: Newsletter

The Impact of a Nationwide Ballot Return DeadlineBy Justin Riemer, President, USGI Last week, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Watson v. Republican National Committee, a case that will determine whether federal law requires the return of mail ballots by Election Day. We covered the legal arguments in Watson in an earlier Grant Report, and now want to briefly unpack the policy ramifications if the Supreme Court rules in the RNC’s favor. Only fourteen states permit a default post-Election Day ballot return, although several among those are universal or heavily vote-by-mail including Oregon, Washington, Nevada, and California. Others are high-population states—including Texas, Illinois, and New York—but have significantly lower mail voting rates. In theory, a large number of voters could be impacted. However, in these states only a small percentage of voters overall take advantage of grace periods. A Votebeat survey found that late arriving mail ballots represented anywhere between .01 to 3.1% of the 2024 General

HAVA’s Unfinished WorkBy Justin Riemer, President, USGI, and Marshal Trigg, Junior Counsel, USGI It has been more than twenty years since Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), and states are still working to get it right.   Take North Carolina. For years, the state’s voter registration form marked HAVA’s mandatory identification fields (driver’s license or partial Social Security number) as optional. A citizen complaint in 2023 finally surfaced the problem, and the state eventually corrected the form—but by then, somewhere in between 100,000 and 250,000 voters had been registered without providing the required information. The issue escalated into parallel litigation: the Republican National Committee sued, and the Department of Justice followed with its own enforcement action. Each case resulted in separate consent judgments. Together, those orders require the state contact affected voters, update records, use provisional ballots for those with missing information, and report to DOJ through 2027. This was also a central issue in an election

On Drawing LinesBy Marshal Trigg, Junior Counsel, USGI With the 2026 midterm primaries already underway, the Supreme Court’s decision to issue an emergency stay of a New York trial court’s redistricting order may prove to be one of the most consequential election law rulings of the cycle. (As a reminder that we told you so, we did predict some eventful shadow docket rulings in our first edition of the year.) The facts of the New York case are straightforward enough. A state trial judge ordered the redrawing of the 11th Congressional District, directing that its boundaries be configured to ensure certain minority voters could elect their preferred candidate. The order directed the state’s independent redistricting commission to produce a new map on an accelerated timeline, with primaries just months away. Congresswoman Malliotakis and others appealed and sought emergency stays with both of New York’s appellate courts. After neither acted, Malliotakis sought a stay from

Debate Rages Over the SAVE America ActBy Justin Riemer, President, USGI Last week, the House of Representatives passed the SAVE America Act (“SAVE”) and sent it to the Senate where it awaits an uncertain future. SAVE would enact nationwide documentary proof of citizenship (DPOC) for voter registration, require voter photo ID, and largely take effect upon enactment. SAVE would also eliminate certain states’ exemptions from requirements of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) and clarify that states can remove noncitizens within the law’s 90-day pre-election list maintenance blackout period. Unsurprisingly, SAVE has ignited fierce debate. The left views DPOC and photo ID requirements as solutions in search of a problem because noncitizen voting and impersonation fraud occur too infrequently to warrant enacting such policies. And any upsides are outweighed by the risk of disenfranchising or at least significantly inconveniencing voters. We are also seeing a lot of predictable fair-weather federalism arguments against

Virginia Elections Have Consequences…for Elections By Justin Riemer, President, USGI Virginians are suddenly finding out that elections have significant consequences, well, for our elections. After securing a clean sweep in November’s contests by flipping the Governor’s, Lt. Governor’s and Attorney General’s offices, and significantly expanding their House of Delegates majority, Virginia Democrats have moved quickly to reshape the Commonwealth’s election landscape. The most consequential change is House Joint Resolution 4 (HJR 4), a proposed constitutional amendment that would permit Virginia to redistrict congressional lines mid-decade if another state does so first. State Democrats are considering creating a 10-to-1 map. HJR 4 may not survive legal challenges, but will go before voters in April if it does, leaving enough time to redistrict prior to November’s midterms. Incoming Attorney General Jay Jones also gave the General Assembly an assist by issuing an official opinion on Inauguration Day that provided the legislature with legal cover on the process for

Off to the RacesBy Justin Riemer, President, USGI, and Marshal Trigg, Junior Counsel, USGI It’s not even February, and as we predicted in the last edition of the Grant Report, 2026 is already shaping up to be an eventful year in election law litigation. Last week’s Supreme Court decision in Bost v. Illinois State Board of Elections expanded candidate standing in a pretty categorical way, exceeding the expectations of many court observers. The Court held that candidates have a concrete and particularized interest in the rules governing how votes in their elections are counted, even without showing that the challenged rule is likely to change the outcome or otherwise harm their electoral prospects. In practical terms, Bost lowers the threshold for pre-election challenges and invites a broader class of candidate-initiated suits. Although election administrators will understandably bemoan the likelihood of facing more lawsuits, we believe Bost will prove to be a net positive for our elections system. It’s a strange

Major Election Law Questions Await Supreme Court Resolution By Justin Riemer, President, USGI As we enter the new year, the Supreme Court is poised to resolve several major election law questions with significant implications for voters, election administrators, candidates, and political parties. Bost v. Illinois State Board of Elections, a case we previously covered, should clarify when candidates have legal standing to challenge election rules. Currently, courts routinely dismiss such cases on standing grounds before they even reach the substantive merits of the case. A ruling for Congressman Bost will significantly impact the election litigation landscape, likely resulting in more court-imposed changes to voting processes. It could also reduce the amount of post-election litigation since candidates, and potentially political parties, would be able to bring viable challenges earlier in the election calendar. There are also important redistricting cases, including Louisiana v. Callais, a case challenging Louisiana’s congressional map as violating

The Long Shadow of Bush v. Gore By Justin Riemer, President, USGI, and Marshal Trigg, Junior Counsel, USGI Twenty-five years ago this month, the Supreme Court decided Bush v. Gore, settling a presidential election determined by 537 votes out of nearly six million cast in Florida—a margin of 0.009%.   The 2000 election was infamous for, among other things, “hanging chads,” but the broader lesson was about how the most technical flaws in election processes can suddenly become decisive in a close race. Palm Beach County’s butterfly ballot design confused many voters, and Duval County’s split-page ballot caused thousands of overvotes. These issues affected only a small percentage of votes, but in such a close election, everything mattered.  The outcome of that election was highly divisive. Yet a resounding bipartisan consensus quickly emerged that we needed to fix persistent systemic weaknesses in election administration to avoid a repeat of 2000.   Congress responded with the Help America Vote Act

The Perils of Online Voting By Justin Riemer, President, USGI, and Marshal Trigg, Junior Counsel, USGI Christmas came early in Anchorage, Alaska, according to the New York Times.  The Mobile Voting Project (“an experiment that feels both inevitable and impossibly futuristic,” cooed the Times) now allows voters to receive and cast ballots entirely online after providing identification to election officials. The article, while noting security concerns, ultimately presents the initiative sympathetically. Anchorage’s election administrator told the paper they’re “trying to make it even easier . . . to vote . . . so you don’t really have an excuse not to vote anymore.”  That framing is a common one; but is voting a service that must be made maximally convenient? And should convenience be subordinate to other considerations like election security? What the Times largely omits is more instructive. A group of the nation’s leading voting security experts issued a pointed response criticizing

What is “Election Day”? The Supreme Court Decides in RNC v. WatsonBy Justin Riemer, President, USGI, and Marshal Trigg, Junior Counsel, USGI Last week, the Supreme Court granted certiorari in Republican National Committee v. Watson, teeing up a pivotal question about federal election law: Does federal law require mail-in ballots to be received by Election Day, or only marked and submitted by that date? At stake is Mississippi’s practice—shared by 15 other states and D.C.—of counting ballots that arrive after Election Day so long as they were mailed on or before that date. Mississippi’s statute, adopted as a temporary COVID-era accommodation and later made permanent, allows ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted if received within five business days afterward.   The case centers on the interpretation of three federal statutes—2 U.S.C. § 7, 2 U.S.C. § 1, and 3 U.S.C. § 1—which set a specific “election day” designated