Supreme Court stays one of the injunctions blocking the mail-in ballot order

24 August 2026

The Supreme Court on 24 August 2026 stayed the injunction that had blocked Executive Order 14399, granting the Justice Department’s application in No. 26A124, Trump v. California, on appeal from the First Circuit (No. 26-1774).¹ The injunction had been entered by United States District Judge Indira Talwani in State of California v. Trump, No. 1:26-cv-11581 (D. Mass. 25 June 2026), for a coalition of 23 states and the District of Columbia.¹² The Department applied on 27 July; Justice Jackson, as Circuit Justice, requested a response by 3 August and referred the application to the Court on 24 August.¹³ The Court acted by per curiam opinion, with Justice Sotomayor dissenting joined by Justice Kagan and Justice Jackson dissenting separately, and denied as moot a parallel application by twelve states led by Alabama, No. 26A139.¹³ The Court did not act on a second injunction, entered by Judge Talwani in League of Women Voters of Massachusetts v. Trump, No. 1:26-cv-11549 (D. Mass. 11 August 2026), which blocks the Postal Service nationwide.²⁴ Three days before the order, the Postal Service filed its final rule, “Ballot Mail For Federal Elections,” amending the Domestic Mail Manual under 39 CFR Part 111, with an effective date of 21 August 2026 and a statement that the Service “will not take actions to implement the rule specifically for the 2026 election unless and until the government obtains relief from those injunctions.”⁴⁵

The Court did not reach the merits of the order; it held that the States were likely not entitled to be in court. “The Government is likely to prevail on the merits of its argument that the District Court lacked jurisdiction to enter the judgment,” and two doctrines supply that conclusion: “Two related doctrines of justiciability block the States’ suit. One is standing, which requires ‘an injury that is concrete, particularized, and imminent rather than “conjectural or hypothetical.”’ … The other is ripeness, which forbids federal courts to adjudicate disputes that are ‘dependent on “contingent future events that may not occur as anticipated, or indeed may not occur at all.”’”¹ Because “standing is not dispensed in gross,” the Court addressed “each challenged provision of the Order separately.”¹ The stay runs “pending the disposition of the appeal in the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and disposition of a petition for a writ of certiorari in this Court, if such a writ is timely sought”; should certiorari be denied it “shall terminate automatically,” and if granted it terminates “upon the sending down of the judgment of this Court.”¹
The stay does not clear the rule, because a second injunction remains in force. The League of Women Voters order runs against the Postal Service nationwide rather than against a list of states, so it does not shrink when the state-coalition injunction is stayed.²⁴ The Postal Service committed not to implement “unless and until the government obtains relief from those injunctions,” naming both cases; the rule does not say whether relief as to one of the two suffices.⁴ A third injunction, entered on 1 July 2026 by the District Court for the District of Columbia in NAACP v. U.S. Postal Service, No. 1:20-cv-2295, rested on a 2021 settlement agreement rather than on the executive order, and the D.C. Circuit stayed it on 17 July 2026 in No. 26-5257, concluding that “even if adopted, that proposed rule likely would not violate … the parties’ settlement agreement.”⁴
The restriction operates on the outbound leg, where a state mails ballots to voters, and not on the ballots voters send back. Executive Order 14399 § 3(b)(iii) directed that the rulemaking bar the Postal Service from transmitting ballots for individuals not enrolled with it on a state-specific list, and the final rule builds that enrolment around a Federal Ballot Mail Portal, DMM 705.24 preparation standards and unique Intelligent Mail barcodes.⁵⁴ A state that does not submit data to the Portal is not ordered to do anything; the ballots it mails to voters fall outside the class the Service will accept for entry (see Executive order directs federal citizenship lists and a Postal Service rulemaking).⁵⁴ The verification standards do not reach the return journey at all: DMM 705.24.5.4 provides that “705.24.5 does not apply to Return Federal Ballot Mail.” The Service also states that the verification process “would not involve voter eligibility determinations in any way” and that under DMM 705.24.5.2 “Postal Service personnel are not authorized to open mail sealed against inspection.”⁴
The rule arrived later than the order required, softened the order’s dates, and is not yet fully operative. Executive Order 14399 § 3(d) required a final rule “no later than 120 days from the date of this order,” which fell on 29 July 2026; the rule was filed 23 days after that date, and the proposed rule, due within 60 days on 30 May, was published on 2 June at 91 FR 32915.⁵⁴ The rule made the order’s 90-day state notice optional under DMM 705.24.2 — “This provision does not require a response from the state official” — and replaced the order’s 60-day list-submission date with a target of “at least 30 days before the election, if possible, or by the date on which ballots must begin being mailed under state law,” which it called “not a rigid deadline.”⁴⁵ The Portal becomes active, with the verification process that relies on its data, only on publication of the system of records governing it; the Service published a proposed notice on 17 July 2026 at 91 FR 44880 and said publication would occur “on or after August 17, 2026,” pending its consideration of comments. As of this date it has not published.⁴ The Service made the rule without notice and comment, being “exempt by 39 U.S.C. § 410(a) from the notice and comment requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act,” but invited comment anyway and received “more than 200,000 responses.”⁴⁶

Trump v. California, No. 26A124, and Alabama v. California, No. 26A139, 609 U.S. ____ (2026) (per curiam), decided 24 August 2026, with Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justice Kagan, dissenting, and Justice Jackson dissenting. The application was docketed 27 July 2026 on appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, No. 26-1774, submitted to Justice Jackson as Circuit Justice, who requested a response by 4 p.m. on 3 August and referred the application to the Court on 24 August. Quoted: the disposition, including “The application for stay presented to Justice Jackson in No. 26A139 and by her referred to the Court is denied as moot”; “The Government is likely to prevail on the merits of its argument that the District Court lacked jurisdiction to enter the judgment”; “Two related doctrines of justiciability block the States’ suit. One is standing, which requires ‘an injury that is concrete, particularized, and imminent rather than “conjectural or hypothetical,”’ Carney v. Adams, 592 U.S. 53, 60 (2020). The other is ripeness, which forbids federal courts to adjudicate disputes that are ‘dependent on “contingent future events that may not occur as anticipated, or indeed may not occur at all,”’ Trump v. New York, 592 U.S. 125, 131 (2020) (per curiam)”; and “Because ‘standing is not dispensed in gross,’ we address each challenged provision of the Order separately,” quoting TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 594 U.S. 413, 431 (2021). The opinion is linked from the docket entry for the application and is not listed on Orders of the Court or on Opinions Relating to Orders for term year 2025. https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25pdf/26a124_hgci.pdf ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷
Andrew Chung, “US Supreme Court hands a win to Trump over mail-in ballot restrictions,” Reuters, 24 August 2026, for the composition of the coalition — “a coalition of 23 mostly Democratic-governed states and Washington, D.C.” — which the opinion does not enumerate, and for the report that the Court “did not act, however, on another injunction issued by Talwani on August 11 that blocked the U.S. Postal Service nationwide.” Reuters reported that “[t]he three liberal justices dissented from the decision” without naming them; the opinion names Justices Sotomayor, Kagan and Jackson, and is the source used here. https://www.reuters.com/world/us-supreme-court-lifts-judicial-hurdle-trumps-mail-in-ballot-curbs-2026-08-24/ ↩ ↩² ↩³
“The latest on the mail-in voting and ballroom battles,” SCOTUSblog, 24 August 2026, and Amy Howe, “Trump administration asks Supreme Court to clear the way for new mail-in voting rule to be implemented,” SCOTUSblog, 3 September 2026, for the procedural history preceding the order: the administration applied on 27 July, “as did a group of 12 states, led by Alabama, that had joined the case on the Trump administration’s side,” and the First Circuit “declined to pause Talwani’s order while the litigation continued.” https://www.scotusblog.com/2026/08/the-latest-on-the-mail-in-voting-and-ballroom-battles/ ↩ ↩²
U.S. Postal Service, “Ballot Mail For Federal Elections,” final rule, 39 CFR Part 111, FR Doc. 2026-17238, filed on public inspection 21 August 2026 at 9:00 p.m. eastern time; “DATES: Effective August 21, 2026.” Cited here from the public-inspection document, publication in the Federal Register not having occurred as of this date. Background citing Executive Order 14399, 91 FR 17125 (2026), and the proposed rule at 91 FR 32915 (2 June 2026), FR Doc. 2026-10968, comment period closed 2 July 2026; “Although exempt by 39 U.S.C. § 410(a) from the notice and comment requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act (‘APA’) (5 U.S.C. § 553) regarding proposed rulemaking, the Postal Service invited public comment”; “The Postal Service received more than 200,000 responses during the comment period”; “organizational commenters individually and jointly submitted over 250 letters”; “Given injunctions currently in place in State of California v. Trump, No. 26-cv-11581 (D. Mass. June 25, 2026), and League of Women Voters of Massachusetts v. Trump, No. 26-cv-11549 (D. Mass. Aug. 11, 2026), the Postal Service will not take actions to implement the rule specifically for the 2026 election unless and until the government obtains relief from those injunctions”; the stayed injunction in NAACP v. U.S. Postal Serv., No. 1:20-cv-2295 (D.D.C. 1 July 2026), stayed by the D.C. Circuit on 17 July 2026 in No. 26-5257, “concluding that ‘even if adopted, that proposed rule likely would not violate … the parties’ settlement agreement’”; “Initial mailing lists should be entered into the Portal at least 30 days before the election, if possible, or by the date on which ballots must begin being mailed under state law. This 30-day timeline, retained without modification in the final rule, is not a rigid deadline”; DMM 705.24.2 (“This provision does not require a response from the state official”); DMM 705.24.5.4 (“705.24.5 does not apply to Return Federal Ballot Mail”); the verification process “would not involve voter eligibility determinations in any way”; DMM 705.24.5.2 (“Postal Service personnel are not authorized to open mail sealed against inspection”); and the system-of-records proposal published 17 July 2026 at 91 FR 44880, with publication of the governing notice “on or after August 17, 2026 (pending the Postal Service’s separate consideration of the comments on that SOR proposal).” https://www.federalregister.gov/public-inspection/2026-17238/ballot-mail-for-federal-elections ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹²
Executive Order 14399 of 31 March 2026, “Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections,” 91 FR 17125–17128 (3 April 2026), FR Doc. 2026-06601; § 3(b)(ii) (optional state notification no fewer than 90 days before a federal election, voter list no fewer than 60 days before); § 3(b)(iii) (Postal Service “shall not transmit mail-in or absentee ballots from any individual unless those individuals have been enrolled on a State-specific list described in subsection (b)(iv) of this section with the USPS pursuant to this subsection”); § 3(d) (final rule “no later than 120 days from the date of this order”). See Executive order directs federal citizenship lists and a Postal Service rulemaking. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/04/03/2026-06601/ensuring-citizenship-verification-and-integrity-in-federal-elections ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵
39 U.S.C. § 410(a): except as provided in subsection (b) and as otherwise provided in title 39, “no Federal law dealing with public or Federal contracts, property, works, officers, employees, budgets, or funds, including the provisions of chapters 5 and 7 of title 5, shall apply to the exercise of the powers of the Postal Service” — chapter 5 of title 5 comprising the Administrative Procedure Act’s rulemaking provisions, including 5 U.S.C. § 553. Subsection (b) enumerates the provisions that do apply to the Postal Service, and § 553 is not among them: the title 5 items listed are §§ 552, 552a, 552b, 3102, 3110, 3333, 5520 and 5532 and chapters 72 and 73. The exemption the rule claims is therefore not qualified by subsection (b). Verified against govinfo’s U.S. Code link service on 21 September 2026; an earlier reading was taken from Cornell’s Legal Information Institute while govinfo’s document delivery was returning HTTP 502. https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title39-section410&edition=prelim ↩

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