5 court cases to watch ahead of Election Day
While Donald Trump and Kamala Harris enter into the final weeks of the presidential campaign, their lawyers are in a final push, too.
In recent weeks, the Republican National Committee and other Trump allies have ramped up an aggressive legal strategy, filing a barrage of election lawsuits across the swing states.
The cases are largely aimed at influencing the election rules before Election Day, although they may also lay the groundwork for Trump to try to overturn the results, as he did four years ago.
Democrats, meanwhile, are using the courts to push back against last-minute efforts by some election officials to change the way votes are counted and results are certified.
While there are likely to be more cases in the coming weeks, here are five cases to watch in the run-up to Election Day:
Dispute over ballot errors in Pennsylvania
Mail ballots have been a target for Republicans since Democrats widely embraced the voting method in the 2020 election.
This cycle, Republicans have filed more than 20 lawsuits related to mail voting, often seeking to have thrown out any mail ballot that does not strictly meet all of the requirements in state law, and seeking to eliminate any opportunities for voters to fix an error with mail ballots.
In Pennsylvania, the Republican National Committee and local lawyers filed a lawsuit last week arguing that voters should not be notified of any errors in their mail ballot nor be allowed to fix them - a process known as "curing." Republicans have tried to challenge this process twice before, in 2020 and in 2022, but lost both times.
The challenge to Pennsylvania's curing provision came less than a week after Republicans won a similar case. In that case, the state Supreme Court ruled that ballots missing dates on their outer envelopes could not be counted. That decision has been appealed.
Challenging Mississippi's rules on late ballots
The Republican National Committee and the Mississippi Republican Party filed a case in January in U.S. District Court challenging Mississippi's policy on late-arriving mail-in ballots. The state's practice has been to accept those ballots as long as they are postmarked on Election Day and arrive within five days. Republicans argue that violates federal law. An effort to bring a similar case in Illinois has already been rejected in the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
In July, a judge ruled against Republicans in the Mississippi case. It is now being heard on appeal at the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Experts expect the case ultimately to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. If the high court takes it up, its ruling could have ramifications for all other states that accept late ballots, including California, Nevada, New York and Texas.
GOP Targets voter rolls in Arizona and beyond
Republicans have long complained that large numbers of ineligible voters are on the rolls.
But this year, Republican lawsuits aimed at "cleaning" the rolls have grown exponentially, largely fueled by specious claims that Democrats are registering millions of immigrants without legal status.
This month, Strong Communities Foundation of Arizona, a nonprofit led by a right-wing operative, filed a lawsuit in state court claiming that Arizona's voter rolls were full of noncitizens. The lawsuit relies on opinion polling and data from other states. It was argued by America First Legal, a group led by Stephen Miller, a close ally of Trump's who has long backed hard-line immigration policies.
In a response, the Democratic National Committee and the Harris-Walz campaign argued that the case violated a federal law barring officials from removing voters from the rolls in the 90 days before an election. In their filing, Democrats questioned the timing: "This perplexing strategy begs the question: Why?"
Democrats fight against Georgia State Election Board
The Democratic National Committee and the state party in Georgia filed a lawsuit challenging the state election board's decision to allow its members to conduct a "reasonable inquiry" into an election's results before certifying them. The party and outside experts have said they worry an inquiry could be used to hold up the process of making the results official. The Democrats are asking the court to mandate that the certification be done by the deadline set in state law.
The issue of certification, until recently a routine, little-noticed function of local and state election boards, became a major flashpoint in 2020 when Trump and his allies tried to pressure local election officials not to certify the results in an attempt to overturn the election. Since then, Democrats and others have sought to shore up the assurance that certification runs smoothly.
A trial in this case is scheduled for Tuesday.
Watching the vote in Arizona
Republicans have filed several cases that oppose efforts to limit harassment of election officials or voters casting their ballot. In February, the Arizona Free Enterprise Club, a conservative nonprofit, filed a case in state court opposing new rules that prohibit people from interfering with or harassing voters as they drop off ballots at drop boxes, and from insulting poll workers and voters. The rules would limit people's protected political speech, the group argued.
The case is being litigated by America First Policy Institute, a group run by close allies of Trump.
In July, the court temporarily blocked the provisions from going into effect. The state has asked a judge to allow it to continue to enforce the rules while the case continues.
This story was originally published September 29, 2024, 2:13 PM.
