The Supreme Court has whiffed again on enforcing clear election laws. On Thursday, over conservative dissents, the Justices allowed the federal Third Circuit Court of Appeals to mandate that Pennsylvania count mail ballots that voters neglected to date. What ballot requirement might a judge let slide next? Apparently we won’t find out until the lawyers get busy after the November elections.
The legal dispute here involves a 2021 judicial race in Lehigh County. Republican David Ritter has a 71-vote lead. There are 257 mail ballots that arrived by the deadline, yet voters submitted them without handwriting a date. Mr. Ritter says tallying them could flip the outcome. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court, no less, has ruled that undated ballots are invalid, because state law unambiguously says voters must “fill out, date and sign” the declaration.
