Pa. Supreme Court agrees to review Washington County无毛视频檚 ballot-curing case
Mike Jones
The state Supreme Court is reviewing a Washington County judge’s order in the recent ballot-curing lawsuit, and it could soon make a ruling that has statewide ramifications.
On Saturday, the high court agreed to hear the appeal by the Republican National Committee and Pennsylvania GOP challenging Judge Brandon Neuman’s ruling – which was recently affirmed by Commonwealth Court – requiring Washington County’s election board to notify voters who have issues with their mail-in ballots and allow them to vote provisionally.
A decision affirming or rejecting Neuman’s order could have wide-ranging effects and change how all 67 counties handle notifying voters of disqualifying errors with their mail-in ballots – such as missing signatures or dates – and what rights those voters have in casting a provisional ballot. The Commonwealth Court’s decision on Sept. 23 upholding Neuman’s order from a month earlier only applied to Washington County.
The RNC and state GOP on Sept. 27 appealed the Commonwealth Court’s decision, and the Supreme Court accepted it on Saturday. That was the same day it announced it would not hear competing appeals by Republicans and the ACLU of Pennsylvania asking the high court to use its “king’s bench” authority to settle questions about mail-in ballots once and for all.
“Petitioners … could have pursued these challenges in a more timely fashion,” Justice Kevin Kevin Brobson wrote in his concurring opinion. “Deciding these questions at this point would, in my view, be highly disruptive to county election administration. Moreover, I can see the potential need to develop a factual record in this matter, which could prove difficult in the compressed timeframe available to us. The decision to deny the application, however, does not mean that these important questions should not be decided in advance of future elections.”
That might be why the Supreme Court took the appeal in Washington County in order to offer a more narrow ruling, and also why it could have statewide impact ahead of the Nov. 5 election.
Washington County’s elections board voted 2-1 in April to not allow ballot curing ahead of the primary, prompting 259 mail-in ballots not to be counted due to having disqualifying errors on the outer envelope that could have been corrected if the voters had been contacted. Seven voters represented by the ACLU and Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia sued the county’s elections board on July 1, claiming they were disenfranchised.
Neuman returned an order that appeared to be a compromise, meaning the county did not have to offer ballot-curing options, but it had to at least notify voters about issues by correctly notating the status of their mail-in ballot, notifying them using contact information in the state’s election database and allowing them to vote with a provisional ballot as a fail-safe measure. The elections board held a special meeting on Oct. 2 and unanimously approved a policy that mirrored Neuman’s order.
According to the ACLU’s online database on ballot curing in Pennsylvania, nine counties across the state are currently using a similar process as Washington County’s elections board approved last week, which includes sending an email notification with instructions to vote provisionally at their polling place on Election Day. Another 16 counties have policies that Washington County previously employed by not notifying votes of problems with their mail-in ballots and not allowing them to vote with a provisional ballot. The vast majority of counties offer “notice and cure” options for voters, meaning people can fix mistakes on their mail-in ballots.
A decision by the state Supreme Court could ultimately bring clarity on the narrow issue involving Washington County, although it’s not known when a ruling might come. The petitioners must submit their briefs by today and the respondents have until Friday to issue their arguments.