WASHINGTON, DC – RITE submitted an amicus brief this week in support of challengers to Illinois’ illegal and reckless election rules that allow ballots to be collected two weeks after Election Day.
RITE’s brief highlights a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that all actions required to finalize the selection of an officeholder must be completed by the end of Election Day. This includes the official receipt of votes, although not necessarily their tabulation and certification. Therefore, just as Illinois cannot keep its polling locations open for voters who swear they wrote down their selections before polls closing, it cannot continue to accept mail-in ballots under the same premise.
“This case is vitally important because it will help bring greater certainty to our electionsElections should not drag on for weeks and months. Ballots received after the deadline set in federal law, whether it comes in by hand or by mail, should not be counted. Aligning Illinois’ election law with federal law will restore critical uniformity in vote counting and eliminate doubts.”
– Derek Lyons, President and CEO of RITE.
According to federal law, Election Day is the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November of every even-numbered year. RITE argues that accepting ballots for an unspecified number of days after an election creates confusion and turmoil. This creates opportunities for substantial mischief and puts a strain on the time needed for tallying, recounting, and certifying results in federal elections, which can be as early as December 8.
RITE also argues:
- “A fully completed absentee ballot sitting on a kitchen table is not a vote because it has not been received. Thus, the actual receipt of the ballot is necessarily one of ‘the final act[s] of selection,’ if not the final act, necessary for a vote to be legally cast.”
- Under the federal Election Day Statutes and the Supreme Court’s decision in Foster v. Love, “receipt of absentee ballots therefore must occur before the end of election day.”
- “Receipt of ballots is … of a different type than those official actions that may permissibly take place after Election Day, like tabulation and certification—which are not part of making a selection of a candidate, but rather the ministerial acts of ascertaining what selections that voters have made. Unlike receipt, tabulation and certification are merely steps that identify those who have been, as of Election Day, selected by the electorate.”
- “Our electoral systems are already under enormous pressures without the gratuitous and illegal strains put upon them by Illinois’s Post-Election Receipt Deadline and its counterparts elsewhere. However well-intentioned that deadline might be, it is as reckless as it is lawless.”
Read the full brief at RITEUSA.org.
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