President Donald Trump listens during a cabinet meeting, Friday, July 31, 2026, at Camp David, the presidential retreat, near Thurmont, Md. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin).
The whipsawing legal battle over the fate of mail-in voting continued late Thursday when a district court judge once again barred the U.S. Postal Service from moving forward with a proposed federal takeover.
"[T]he Constitution charges the States with election administration," the 11-page order reads. "While the States' decisions may be pre-empted by Congress, the court is unaware of, and no party has proffered, any delegation Congress has made that would permit the USPS to regulate election mail."
Since spring, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani, a Barack Obama appointee, has found herself enmeshed in various discrete disputes over President Donald Trump's March executive order directing the USPS to substantially restrict vote-by-mail systems. Yet, for months, the upshot of that presidential fiat was unclear.
But the formal legal confusion was little matter for Talwani — and a decided boon for plaintiffs in lawsuits challenging the restrictions.
Operating on different theories and similar causes of action, the Massachusetts-based court issued two injunctions against the USPS.
One injunction came in June after 23 states and the District of Columbia claimed the proposed changes conflict with constitutional prerogatives for state-based control over elections. A second, nationwide injunction came in early August after the League of Women Voters claimed the proposed changes would hamper its ability to properly educate voters.
First appealing the June injunction, the Trump administration said the litigation — and relief granted to the plaintiffs — was too speculative. While declining to defend the executive order on the merits, the Department of Justice argued the issue was not yet legally "ripe."
In other words, the government said the executive order did not actually do anything concrete. And, the DOJ added, the injunction stopped the USPS from even trying to interpret Trump's order.
This argument did not convince the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit in the case won by California. But the same argument did convince the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court.
The government's shadow docket victory included some key winking — to and from the DOJ and the justices in the majority.
In its late July emergency application for a stay, the Trump administration told the high court "the agencies are unable to take steps to carry out the Executive Order" due to the injunction in the California case. But at more or less the exact same time, the USPS was actually engaged in rulemaking regarding the executive order.
The government admitted to completing rulemaking on Aug. 21. The Supreme Court still credited the notion that the rulemaking process was being held back by the California injunction on Aug. 24.
This did not go unnoticed.
"The Supreme Court accepted the government's feigned compliance," Talwani observed earlier this week in an order finding that the USPS violated the injunction in the League of Women Voters case.
The court also made sure to recall this state of affairs in her latest order enjoining aspects of the rule issued by the USPS.
"Although the Supreme Court expressed concern that this court's injunction 'prevent[ed] the Postal Service from so much as initiating a rulemaking that could yield a rule applicable to these States,' no such delay occurred, as the USPS had gone ahead and noticed a proposed rule, solicited and reviewed comments, and issued a Final Rule," Talwani again observed.
This violation hastened the already harried pace of the back-and-forth dispute over the executive order.
On Monday, armed with the ruling in the state case, the government asked for the League's injunction to be dissolved.
On Tuesday, Talwani found the government violated the injunction, but she declined to issue a remedy "other than identifying the violation."
On Wednesday, Talwani agreed with the government and dissolved the League's injunction. Minutes later, the League filed a new version of its lawsuit. The states filed another lawsuit altogether.
On Thursday evening, Talwani enjoined the USPS from implementing or enforcing several sections of the rule for at least 14 days.
"Now that the USPS has published the Final Rule, Plaintiffs' challenges are ripe," the judge explained. "The Final Rule's mandatory requirements necessitating immediate action of Plaintiff States likely constitute concrete injury-in-fact, caused by the new regulatory scheme and redressable only by injunctive relief."
The court elaborates on those likely injuries:
[T]he USPS is refusing to send mail ballots to eligible voters unless States or local election officials submit their mail ballot envelopes and return envelopes and receive advance approval from the USPS without regard to impending deadlines for the November 3, 2026 election.
"Most Plaintiff States have already ordered their mail ballots, and some are required by state law to send them to eligible voters as early as next week," the order goes on. "Plaintiff States have neither time nor funds to design new mail ballots, seek approval of the new designs, [and] order production of mail ballots … all before the midterms."