## Facts

- Wisconsin law required absentee ballots to be received by election day to be counted.
- Due to COVID-19-related mail delays and administrative burdens, a federal district court ordered a temporary extension: ballots postmarked by election day could be counted if received within six additional days.
- The Seventh Circuit stayed the district court’s injunction, concluding the district court improperly altered state election rules close to the election and intruded on the legislature’s authority.
- The Democratic National Committee and other applicants sought Supreme Court emergency relief to vacate the stay and reinstate the district court’s extension.
- The Supreme Court denied the application to vacate the stay; separate concurring and dissenting writings explained differing rationales.

## Issues

1. Whether the Supreme Court should vacate the Seventh Circuit’s stay of a district court injunction extending Wisconsin’s absentee-ballot receipt deadline because of COVID-19-related disruptions.
2. Whether, close to an election, a federal court may alter a state’s legislatively enacted ballot-receipt deadline absent a clear constitutional or statutory violation.

## Decision

- The Court denied the application to vacate the stay, leaving the Seventh Circuit’s stay in place.
- As a result, Wisconsin’s statutory requirement that absentee ballots be received by election day governed the election.
- Concurring Justices relied primarily on the rule against late federal-court changes to election procedures and on constitutional allocation of election-rule authority to state legislatures.
- The dissent argued that refusing to allow the limited extension would likely disenfranchise large numbers of voters because of predictable mail delays.

## Legal Principles

- Federal courts generally should not change state election rules shortly before an election because late changes risk voter confusion and administrative disruption (often identified with the rule in *Purcell v. Gonzalez*).
- Under the Elections Clause framework emphasized by the concurrences, state legislatures bear primary responsibility for setting rules for federal elections, and federal courts should be hesitant to substitute their policy judgments for legislative choices.
- Emergency equitable relief is less likely when applicants have not shown a strong likelihood of a constitutional or statutory violation, especially where the challenged rule is common and the state has provided alternative voting accommodations.
- The dissenting view treated election-administration cautions as nonabsolute and weighed them against factual findings that existing deadlines would likely prevent timely-cast votes from being counted during an extraordinary public-health event.

## Conclusion

The Court’s emergency order preserved Wisconsin’s election-day absentee-ballot receipt deadline by declining to disturb the appellate stay, reflecting a strong reluctance to permit late federal-court alterations of state election rules and a dispute among the Justices about how to weigh administrative stability against likely voter disenfranchisement in emergency conditions.


Democratic Nat'l Comm. v. Wis. State Legislature, 141 S. Ct. 28 (2020)