Arizona and other states sue to block new USPS mail-ballot rule

Coverage spread: 2 sources — 2 unrated

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Where they agree

Arizona joined roughly 24-25 Democrat-led states in suing to block a new USPS mail-ballot rule.
The rule stems from a March executive order by President Trump and would require ballots to go only to voters on a national USPS eligibility list, with new envelope design standards.
The Supreme Court recently ruled against states’ earlier challenge on procedural grounds, prompting the new lawsuit, and a federal judge lifted a pause on the policy accordingly.
Arizona is mailing ballots to overseas and military voters around Sept. 19, leaving a narrow window before the rule could take effect.

Where they differ

ABC15 centers its story on Attorney General Kris Mayes’ pointed quotes (“over my dead body”) and the lawsuit’s legal arguments against the USPS rule.
Arizona Mirror’s Aug. 26 piece focuses more on the procedural history — the Supreme Court’s earlier ruling and the refiling — with less direct quotation.
Arizona Mirror separately covers an unrelated but concurrent story: the 2021 state law that will purge hundreds of thousands of voters from the automatic mail list starting in 2027, a topic ABC15 does not address.
ABC15 provides specific ballot-mailing dates and voter percentages (three-quarters of Arizonans voting by mail), details not present in the Mirror’s lawsuit coverage.

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes has joined a 25-state lawsuit against the U.S. Postal Service, seeking to block a new rule that would require mail ballots to be delivered only to voters listed on a national eligibility roll maintained by USPS. Separately, a state law signed in 2021 is set to trigger the removal of hundreds of thousands of Arizonans from the state’s automatic mail ballot list starting in 2027. Both developments affect how Arizonans access mail voting, though they stem from different sources: one a federal postal regulation under legal challenge, the other a long-standing state statute about to take effect.

What does the new USPS rule actually require?

The rule, announced by the Postal Service last Friday, follows an executive order President Donald Trump issued in March targeting mail ballots. It would require every state to register eligible mail voters with USPS, which would then build state-specific voter lists and only deliver ballots to people on those lists. States would also have to redesign ballot envelopes to meet new USPS design standards and get federal approval for them.

Why did Arizona and other states sue now?

Arizona and other states had already sued earlier this year to stop Trump’s March executive order, but the U.S. Supreme Court ruled this week that those earlier challenges were filed too soon — a procedural, not substantive, win for the administration. Mayes said the ruling essentially told states to refile, which is what the new 25-state lawsuit does. A federal judge has since lifted a nationwide pause on the policy in line with the high court’s decision.

Mayes was blunt in her opposition, telling reporters “over my dead body is that rule going to go into effect” and calling it “unconstitutional” and “completely impossible” to implement given the timeline. She argued the rule amounts to federal overreach into a process the Constitution assigns to states: “States run our elections, period — not the Postal Service and not the president.”

How much time is left before this could affect ballots?

The timing is tight. Arizona counties are already finalizing ballots, with mail ballots going out to overseas and military voters on Sept. 19 — just over three weeks from the rule’s announcement. Early voting in Arizona is set to begin in 42 days. Mayes argued the rule would force states to overhaul ballot envelope designs and hand over voter rolls to USPS on a timeline that makes compliance practically impossible before this year’s election. It remains unclear whether the rule could take effect in time to affect the current election cycle.

What’s the separate mail-list removal issue about?

Apart from the federal rule fight, a 2021 Arizona law signed by then-Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican, is set to result in its first round of voter removals from the state’s Active Early Voting List — the list that lets voters automatically receive a mail ballot each election without requesting one. Under the statute, county recorders must remove voters from that list if they haven’t used a mail ballot for a certain period, and 2027 will mark the first year those removals take effect, potentially affecting hundreds of thousands of Arizonans who currently receive ballots automatically.

Why does this matter for Arizona voters?

More than three-quarters of Arizonans vote by mail, according to Mayes, making the state especially exposed to disruptions in mail voting rules. Trump, who has himself voted by mail, has pushed to curtail the practice nationally, citing fraud concerns that Mayes and other officials say are unsupported by evidence. Between the pending USPS rule and the 2027 list purge, Arizona’s mail voting system faces two distinct pressures — one from federal regulation now in court, the other from a state law about to take effect — that could each reduce the number of voters receiving ballots automatically in the coming years.

Sources

Featured photo: Lightandtruth via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)