{"id":1683549,"date":"2022-10-11T12:07:44","date_gmt":"2022-10-11T16:07:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1683549"},"modified":"2022-10-11T12:08:22","modified_gmt":"2022-10-11T16:08:22","slug":"scotus-backs-republican-in-pennsylvania-mail-in-ballots-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/scotus-backs-republican-in-pennsylvania-mail-in-ballots-case\/","title":{"rendered":"SCOTUS Backs Republican in Pennsylvania Mail-In Ballots Case"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">16<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fscotus-backs-republican-in-pennsylvania-mail-in-ballots-case%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1683549&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The Supreme Court on Tuesday vacated an appeals court decision that required\u00a0Pennsylvania to count mail-in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-ballots\">ballots<\/a> even if there is no date on the envelope.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe judgment is vacated, and the case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit with instructions to dismiss the case as moot,\u201d wrote\u00a0Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.supremecourt.gov\/orders\/courtorders\/101122zor_5426.pdf\">pdf<\/a>), siding with David Ritter, an unsuccessful Republican candidate for a judgeship.<\/p>\n<p>They also threw out a U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals\u2019 ruling that allowed the counting of mail-in ballots in the race that Ritter had sought to remove because voters did not write the date on the ballots. Ritter lost his 2021 bid to serve on the Lehigh County Court of Common Pleas\u00a0after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mcall.com\/news\/elections\/mc-nws-pa-undated-supreme-count-20220610-hc7z3gfdazdddfgw3r2t6u65va-story.html\">257 mail-in ballots<\/a> that didn\u2019t have dates were counted.<\/p>\n<p>Pennsylvania Republican legislators and conservatives filed amicus briefs saying the 3rd Circuit\u2019s ruling threatened the integrity of the 2022 midterm elections.<\/p>\n<p>But the Supreme Court\u2019s action on Tuesday means that the 3rd Circuit ruling cannot be used as a precedent in the three states covered by this regional federal appellate court\u2014Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware\u2014to allow the counting of ballots with minor flaws such as the voter failing to fill in the date. Vacating the ruling does not change Ritter\u2019s loss in his race.<\/p>\n<h2>Previous Ruling<\/h2>\n<p>Earlier this year, the Supreme Court denied Ritter\u2019s attempt to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/mkt_app\/supreme-court-lifts-stay-allows-counting-of-questionable-ballots-in-pennsylvania-judicial-election_4524441.html\">block<\/a> the counting of ballots that lacked dates. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch dissented.\u00a0Days before that (<a href=\"https:\/\/www2.ca3.uscourts.gov\/opinarch\/221499p.pdf\">pdf<\/a>), a panel on the 3rd Circuit ordered the counting of the undated ballots.<\/p>\n<p>Alito had written that the lower court\u2019s ruling \u201ccould well affect the outcome\u201d of the elections this year as voters go to the polls on Nov. 8 in midterms in which Republicans are seeking to seize control of Congress from the Democrats.<\/p>\n<p>And he cited concerns that an \u201cindividual\u2019s vote is not counted because he or she did not follow the rules for casting a ballot,\u201d adding that the appeals court interpretation is \u201cvery likely wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_4027019\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/img.theepochtimes.com\/assets\/uploads\/2021\/10\/01\/samuel-alito-1200x800.jpg\"><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\"><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-4027019 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/img.theepochtimes.com\/assets\/uploads\/2021\/10\/01\/samuel-alito-1200x800.jpg\" alt=\"Epoch Times Photo\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" \/><\/noscript><\/figcaption><\/a> Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito poses in Washington on April 23, 2021. (Erin Schaff\/Pool via Reuters)<\/figure>\n<h2>Law<\/h2>\n<p>The 3rd Circuit had ruled that invalidating the updated ballots would violate a provision of a landmark 1964 federal law called the Civil Rights Act aimed at ensuring that minor ballot errors do not deny someone the right to vote.<\/p>\n<p>The May ruling by the 3rd Circuit came in a lawsuit by several elderly voters upset that their votes would not be counted for neglecting to write the date on the mail-in ballot envelope, and what they called a \u201cmeaningless technicality.\u201d\u00a0The 3rd Circuit\u2019s rulings also apply to the U.S. Virgin Islands territory.<\/p>\n<p>However,\u00a0Pennsylvania law stipulates that voters are mandated to write the date on the outer envelope on their mail-in ballot.<\/p>\n<p>Before the Supreme Court\u2019s Tuesday ruling, Republican state\u00a0Sen. David Argall told\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mcall.com\/news\/elections\/mc-nws-pa-undated-supreme-count-20220610-hc7z3gfdazdddfgw3r2t6u65va-story.html\">The Morning Call<\/a> that \u201cthere are likely to be many issues that come up during the November election\u201d and noted other provisions, including the controversial Act 77 overhaul that was enacted in 2019 that made widespread vote-by-mail possible in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n<p>Several Republican-led states have enacted tougher voting rules, including for mail-in ballots, following the 2020 election.\u00a0In Pennsylvania, there is a closely watched U.S. Senate race between Republican Mehmet Oz and Democrat John Fetterman that could help determine which party controls that chamber.<\/p>\n<p><em>Reuters contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"author_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"one_author_block round\">\n<div class=\"top_row\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/author-jack-phillips\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/img.theepochtimes.com\/assets\/uploads\/2019\/06\/13\/Jack-Phillips.jpg\" alt=\"Jack Phillips\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"names\">\n<p>Breaking News Reporter<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Follow<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Jack Phillips is a breaking news reporter at The Epoch Times based in New York.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Supreme Court on Tuesday vacated an appeals court decision that required\u00a0Pennsylvania to count mail-in ballots even if there is no date on the envelope.\u201cThe judgment is vacated, and the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1683551,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1683549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1683549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1683549"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1683549\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1683551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1683549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1683549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1683549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}