One particularly alarming concern: the system could reject tens of thousands of ballots in a bulk mailing if just one of the ballots in the bulk fails to scan properly.
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USPS rushes mail-ballot rule already blocked by judges, letting one bad scan void tens of thousands of ballots.
As it ran on the front
Document first: a federal whistleblower disclosure, filed this week, describing a US Postal Service system rushed into place without public notice. All together now — clause one: the system can reject "tens of thousands of ballots in a bulk mailing if just one of the ballots in the bulk fails to scan properly." One scanner hiccup, one whole town's ballots, gone. The filing does not say which town. It does not have to.
This is not a rule appearing from nowhere. On August 26th, a coalition of two dozen Democratic-led states sued to stop it, calling the underlying USPS order — which withholds ballots in states that won't hand voter data to the federal government — a "direct violation of the Constitution." Two days later, Judge Indira Talwani in Boston agreed, issuing a complete block on the rule.…
…(cont) Rewind further, and the story already had an ending written for it, then erased. On August 25th, the Supreme Court's majority lifted a lower court's injunction on the same underlying order — Trump's directive instructing Homeland Security to compile citizen-voter lists for states to hand to USPS — ruling 6–3 that the states challenging it lacked standing. Enjoined, then un-enjoined, then blocked again by a different judge on a different theory. And now, per this week's disclosure, quietly built out anyway while the litigation keeps running.
All together now — clause two, the one that survives the courtroom noise: the rejection is automatic, and it is bulk. It does not examine the ballot that failed. It examines the batch. A signature mismatch, a smudge, a machine having a bad Tuesday — the filing does not distinguish — and every ballot shipped alongside it stops existing as a vote before anyone with a name and a badge looks at a single one of them.
Senator Sanders called this part of an "authoritarian power grab" and an "assault on mail-in voting." That is a characterization. What is not a characterization is the sentence an anonymous federal employee felt obligated to put in writing before the midterms: tens of thousands, one scan, bulk. The document is not accusing anyone of anything. It is describing, plainly, what the machine has already been told to do.
“They don't need to steal your vote one at a time anymore, that's slow — rig one scanner, sink a whole mail truck's worth of ballots at once, and call the paperwork "election security" while the Supreme Court holds the door open for it. A judge already blocked this exact rule and it's out there running anyway, and that's the part that should scare you more than the scanner. That's not an error rate, that's a kill switch with your neighborhood's name printed on the batch.”
The receipts
A federal judge in Boston on Thursday evening issued a new and complete block on rules recently set forth by the US Postal Service designed to severely restrict mail-in voting nationwide—a ruling that comes just days after the US Supreme…
The Supreme Court on Monday lifted a lower court’s injunction on President Trump’s executive order seeking to limit mail-in voting ahead of November’s midterm elections. Trump’s order directs the Department of Homeland Security to create state-by-state lists of eligible voters who are citizens. The U.S.
A coalition of two dozen Democratic-led states filed a lawsuit on Wednesday challenging President Donald Trump's attempt to use the US Postal Service as a vehicle for his assault on mail-in voting, which he has targeted incessantly during…
Democratic leaders and a " pro-voter " coalition on Tuesday announced separate actions to combat President Donald Trump's attack on voting by mail after the US Supreme Court's right-wing majority delivered a " painful setback " for critics…
Sen. Bernie Sanders warned Tuesday that President Donald Trump's attempt to leverage the US Postal Service to advance his assault on mail-in voting is part of a broader and intensifying "authoritarian power grab" that poses an existential threat to American democracy. "The Trump administration is trying to use the United States Postal…
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.