Supreme Court Turns Down Request to Allow All Texans to Vote by Mail

Source: New York Times

Adam Liptak
June 26, 2020, 5:25 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court said on Friday that it would not require Texas to let all eligible voters vote by mail.

The Texas Democratic Party and several voters had urged the court to reinstate a federal trial judge’s injunction requiring state officials to allow all voters, and not just those who are 65 or older, to submit their ballots by mail. They relied on the 26th Amendment, which lowered the voting age to 18 and said the right to vote “shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of age.”

The court’s brief order gave no reasons, which is typical when the justices rule on emergency applications, and there were no noted dissents. Justice Sonia Sotomayor issued a statement saying that the question in the case raised “weighty but seemingly novel questions regarding the 26th Amendment.”

But she said the court was right not to address those questions in the context of an emergency application. “I hope,” she wrote, “that the court of appeals will consider the merits of the legal issues in this case well in advance of the November election.”

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/us/supreme-court-texas-vote-by-mail.html