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Civil Rights Groups Urge Supreme Court to Block USPS Rule Threatening Mail-in Ballots Weeks Before Midterm Elections
WASHINGTON – Asian Law Caucus, Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Atlanta, Missouri Voter Protection Coalition, South Asian American Justice Collaborative, and Common Cause today filed an amicus brief in the United States Supreme Court on behalf of 20 civil rights and community organizations urging the Court to reject the Trump administration’s latest attempt to impose new and restrictive barriers to mail-in voting just weeks before the November 2026 midterm elections.
The filing comes after a federal court on September 4 blocked the United States Postal Service (USPS) from implementing mandatory provisions of its new Ballot Mail for Federal Elections rule for the November 3 election. The Trump administration has since asked the Supreme Court to pause the injunction and allow the new requirements to take effect while litigation continues. The USPS rule follows directives from Trump’s Executive Order 14399 and would impose disruptive new federal requirements on states that use mail-in voting. States would be required to submit records of eligible voters to a new USPS Federal Ballot Mail Portal, and the postal service would also provide states with lists of people enrolled to vote by mail and outdated immigration data. Under the rule, states would send ballots only to voters whose information is included in the portal system – which is reported to be flawed and untested.
These USPS requirements would undermine access to the ballot, potentially take away the ability to vote for tens of millions of Americans, and bring unnecessary federal interference into state elections administration. Given that nearly one in three voters cast mail-in ballots in the 2024 federal election, civil rights and voting rights organizations are alarmed that the threats themselves – let alone implementation, which would change the shape of elections as we know them – to mail-in voting procedures would interfere with the votes of millions and create further confusion and uncertainty.
“This rule is yet another attempt by the Trump administration to suppress your votes in the election. Think about the voter who needs more time to understand their ballot, or the older voter who cannot easily get to the polls, or the family that just moved and is waiting for their ballots to arrive. These stories represent millions of Americans, just like you and me, who have followed all the rules, only to potentially have the broken and clunky USPS mishandle our right to vote,” said Aarti Kohli, executive director at Asian Law Caucus. “That is why ALC is leading a group of civil rights organizations in asking the Supreme Court to pause implementation. With mere weeks until the election, we don’t have time to risk upending mail-in voting – and our democracy along with it.”
USPS mail-in ballot changes create new barriers for voters
The brief argues that these last minute federal changes to state-run elections changes would particularly jeopardize voters who have historically relied on voting by mail, including naturalized citizens, voters with limited English proficiency, older voters, voters with disabilities, lower-income voters, and voters who move frequently. Thirty-six percent of naturalized citizens voted by mail in November 2024, compared with 28 percent of U.S.-born citizens. Nationally, 47 percent of Asian American voters and 34 percent of Latine voters cast ballots by mail in the 2024 election.
For voters with limited English proficiency, voting by mail provides crucial time and support to understand their ballots. In the brief, voters explain they prefer voting by mail because it gives them time to read their ballots, understand propositions, and use a dictionary or seek translation help from a family member. Voters with disabilities and older voters disproportionately rely on mail voting, while voters who move frequently or experience housing instability could face additional barriers under the new policy.
“President Trump's Executive Order threatens to strip millions of eligible voters nationwide of their right to vote by mail, silencing communities that depend on it to be heard. It hands an agency widely criticized for lawlessness and abuse of power the authority to decide who gets to participate in our democracy,” said Murtaza Khwaja, executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta. “We urge the Court to reject this stay and protect voters from the irreversible harm this order would cause to free and fair elections.
"Naturalized citizens, Asian Americans, voters with disabilities, and limited English proficient voters didn't create the flaws in these federal databases, but they're the ones who'll pay for them when they're shut out of our democracy," said Ronak Patel, staff attorney at the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF). "This isn't a hypothetical risk; it's a documented, intentional pattern of disenfranchisement, and the Supreme Court must not let it move forward weeks before an election. This executive order would shut voters out of the democratic process based on a USPS process nobody can even explain, weeks before a major federal election."
Last-minute changes create confusion and threaten voter participation
Civil rights organizations warn that the Executive Order and federal agencies’ attempts to implement it have already caused uncertainty among eligible voters about whether they can continue voting by mail, whether their information will appear correctly in federal systems, and how they can fix errors.These groups are fielding concerns from voters and preparing to help communities navigate confusion caused by the federal government’s proposed changes.
Allowing the USPS rule to take effect now, the organizations argue, could cause irreversible harm, especially to voters who do not receive an expected ballot in the mail and may have little or no opportunity to correct the error before Election Day.
“Once an election has passed, a lost opportunity to vote cannot be restored,” said Kalpana Peddibhotla, executive director of SAAJCO. “Voting by mail is not simply a convenience. It is how seniors, people with disabilities, caregivers, working families, and others make their voices heard. Changing the rules as people are preparing to vote creates confusion and risks shutting voters out of our democracy. The Supreme Court should protect voters by keeping these restrictions blocked.”
“Filing this Supreme Court brief shows our total commitment to protecting vote-by-mail for every single voter, building on our separate federal lawsuit, NAACP v. Trump," said Maryam Jazini Dorcheh, vice president of litigation at Common Cause. "We refuse to back down against illegal efforts to restrict access to voting, and we will keep using every legal tool we have to fight back. Outside the courtroom, our nonpartisan Election Protection volunteers are working nationwide to help voters cast their mail-in ballots safely.”
“In states like Missouri where voting rules are being weaponized for political gain, voters need to know that they will be able to cast a ballot that counts,” said Denise Lieberman, Director and General Counsel of the Missouri Voter Protection Coalition. “Voters who most rely on voting by mail - seniors, voters with disabilities, rural voters, low-wage workers, voters with limited English proficiency, caregivers - would be disparately prevented from having their vote count. We urge the Court to reject the stay to prevent irreparable harm of their lost votes.”
Signatories to the amicus brief include AAPI Equity Alliance, Arizona Asian American Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander for Equity, Asian Americans Advancing Justice of Southern California, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders of New Jersey, Asian Law Alliance, Chinese for Affirmative Action, Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, Council on American-Islamic Relations, Equal Justice Society, Hands United, LEAD Filipino, Mekong NYC, OneAmerica, Parent-Child Relationship Association, Public Counsel, SAATH, Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network, Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund, Stop AAPI Hate, and The Workers Circle.
About the Organizations
Asian Law Caucus (ALC) was founded in 1972 as the nation's first legal and civil rights organization focusing on the needs of low-income, immigrant and underserved Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Recognizing that social, economic, political, and racial inequalities continue to exist in the United States, ALC is committed to the pursuit of equality and justice for all sectors of our society. Learn more at www.asianlawcaucus.org
Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) is a national civil rights organization founded in 1974 to protect and promote the rights of Asian Americans. AALDEF serves diverse Asian communities around the country in solidarity with each other, communities of color, and marginalized groups. Community lawyering is at the heart of AALDEF’s work, which combines litigation, advocacy, education, and organizing to secure human rights for all people. Learn more at www.aaldef.org
Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta (Advancing Justice-Atlanta) is the first nonprofit legal advocacy organization dedicated to protecting the civil rights of Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, Pacific Islanders (AANHPI) and Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian (AMEMSA) communities in Georgia and the Southeast. Learn more at www.advancingjustice-atlanta.org
Common Cause is a nonpartisan, grassroots organization dedicated to upholding the core values of American democracy.
Missouri Voter Protection Coalition (MOVPC) is Missouri’s nonpartisan voting rights table dedicated to advancing free, fair, and accessible voting and strengthening democratic participation from underrepresented communities. MOVPC works to safeguard all available voting options for Missouri voters, including voting by mail. MOVPC works to identify and eliminate barriers to voting through policy advocacy, strategic litigation, voter education and by anchoring statewide nonpartisan Election Protection efforts in Missouri.
The South Asian American Justice Collaborative (SAAJCO) is a national nonprofit organization dedicated to fighting for the civil and human rights of the South Asian diaspora in the United States through legal advocacy, community engagement, and narrative power .Learn more at www.saajco.org.