CBS News election analyst David Becker told "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan" that there is "simply no time" to put in place President Trump's executive order restricting mail voting. "I think for 2026, this is almost certainly not…
Page A16From§Eachthe late evening edition — 30 August 2026
Democrat calls for a 13-justice Supreme Court as election official says there's no time for Trump's mail-voting order.
As it ran on the front
Here's what nobody wants you connecting: same week, one guy who sits in Congress says thirteen is a pretty good number for the Supreme Court, and an election law expert on national television says there is no time left to run the President's mail-voting order before it matters. Different building, different mic, same message: the rules everybody agreed to are open for renegotiation, live, on your television, and you weren't in the room either time.
Now, adding justices to the Supreme Court isn't a crazy idea on its own — nine was never in the Constitution, it's a number Congress picked in 1869 and never revisited, which is exactly the kind of fact people bring up right before they change something for reasons that have nothing to do with the number. But notice the timing. It's not a proposal that shows up when the Court is popular. It shows up right after a ruling somebody didn't like, which is the same energy as the guy at the DMV who wants to change the line right after he loses his spot in it.…
…(cont) And on the other side of the building, you've got an actual election official — not a pundit, the guy who ran actual elections — going on the Sunday shows to say, calmly, on the record, that there is no time left to implement an executive order about how people vote. That's not a hot take. That's a guy telling you the clock ran out on something that's supposed to take months, because somebody signed it like it takes a phone call.
Put those two next to each other and you get the same picture from two different angles: the size of the Court and the shape of the ballot are both, this week, up for grabs, and the people grabbing aren't asking you first. They're asking each other, on camera, in complete sentences, like it's normal. That's the tell. When it's normal, it's on the news at six. When it's actually being renegotiated, it's on Face the Nation, said pleasantly, and everybody moves on to the weather.
Nobody's coming to take your vote at gunpoint. They're just making sure that by the time you notice the goalposts moved, there's no time left to put them back. Write that down. Then watch how fast everybody insists you imagined it.
“Here's what nobody wants you connecting: same week, one guy in Congress says thirteen's a pretty good number for the Supreme Court, and the guy who actually ran elections says there's no time left to run the President's mail-voting order before it matters. Different building, different mic, same message — the rules everybody agreed to are up for renegotiation live, and you weren't in the room either time. When it's actually happening, it's said pleasantly on a Sunday show, and everybody moves on to the weather.”
The receipts
Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) on Sunday called for an expansion of the Supreme Court's nine justices to 13, calling that increase a "pretty good number." "Meet the Press" host Kristen Welker asked Clyburn if he agreed with former Vice…
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.