The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Monday ordered Democratic-run counties to abide by its previous rulings and reiterated that they can’t count misdated mail ballots from the 2024 election.
The judicial rebuke comes after Democratic officials in at least three key Pennsylvania counties decided to count mail-in ballots that were missing a date or contained a mismatched date — which defied a pre-election ruling from the state’s highest court that those ballots are invalid.
Every last ballot is under scrutiny amid the ongoing recount between Democratic Sen. Bob Casey and Republican Dave McCormick, who is leading by about 17,000 votes as on Monday afternoon. CNN has not yet made a projection.
In a short and unsigned 4-3 decision, the top court said “this order shall be deemed authoritative and controlling in all such matters and as to all county election board members.” The decision also reminded all counties not to count these disputed ballots.
Two justices — one Democrat and one Republican — wrote in a searing concurring statement that “it is critical to the rule of law that individual counties and municipalities and their elected and appointed officials, like any other parties, obey orders of this Court.” They invoked a 1947 ruling warning of “tyranny” when court orders are ignored.
A separate sternly worded concurrence signed by three justices said they wanted to “disabuse local elections officials of the notion that they have the authority to ignore Election Code provisions that they believe are unconstitutional.”
The three dissenting justices said they would’ve let the matter play out in lower courts.
Republicans filed the lawsuit after Democratic commissioners in a few key counties, including Philadelphia, decided to count disputed mail and provisional ballots, even though the high court told them not to. Some of these Democrats argued that voters shouldn’t be punished for accidentally misdating a ballot or forgetting an extra signature.
Most of these votes were expected to favor Casey, but he and McCormick roughly split a batch of 600 disputed mail and provisional ballots in Bucks County, CNN reported.
The controversy went viral last week, gaining widespread attention on right-wing channels like Fox News and online from Elon Musk, the Trump ally and tech billionaire.
”No more excuses. Election officials in Bucks, Montgomery, Philadelphia, and other counties have absolutely no choice but to reject illegal ballots. We will hold them to it,” Republican National Committee chairman Michael Whatley posted to X.