Well, folks, the Supreme Court just handed the Republican National Committee a polite but firm "no thanks" on their latest bid to tighten voting rules in Pennsylvania.
In a nutshell, the high court on Friday in 2025 declined to block a Pennsylvania ruling that lets voters cast in-person ballots on Election Day if their mail-in votes get tossed out over technical glitches, News Nation reported.
This saga started with two Pennsylvania voters, Faith Genser and Frank Matis, who tried to vote by mail in the state’s 2024 Democratic primary but sent in “naked” ballots—missing the required secrecy envelope.
After officials rejected their mail ballots, Genser and Matis went to their polling place and cast provisional ballots, but the Butler County elections board refused to count them.
Their rejection sparked a lawsuit that reached Pennsylvania’s top court, where a narrow 4–3 ruling gave voters like them a second chance to vote in person on Election Day.
Here’s the rub: Pennsylvania state law explicitly says officials “shall not count” such votes if the mail-in ballot was received on time, yet the state court overrode that, affecting thousands of voters each election cycle.
The RNC, backed by the Republican Party of Pennsylvania and the Butler County Board of Elections, wasn’t about to let that slide, so they took their fight to the Supreme Court, hoping to rein in state courts on election matters.
Their attorneys at Jones Day argued, “Failure to correct” this ruling would undermine the Constitution itself. But let’s be real—sounds like a strong pitch, yet the justices didn’t bite, perhaps sensing this isn’t the hill to die on.
Before this latest rejection, the Supreme Court had already turned down the RNC’s emergency request to intervene prior to the 2024 election, where President Trump narrowly bested former Vice President Kamala Harris in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania before reclaiming the White House.
Interestingly, a software malfunction caused the court’s latest announcement—originally meant for Monday morning—to leak early on Friday, according to a spokesperson.
Technology strikes again—turns out even the Supreme Court isn’t immune to a glitchy rollout. Still, the early leak didn’t change the outcome: the RNC’s plea was denied, leaving the Pennsylvania ruling intact.
The RNC had hoped this case would be the moment for the Supreme Court to set a clear test for when state courts overstep on election rules, especially after the court’s 2023 decision declined to fully embrace the “independent state legislature” theory that would limit such oversight.
In that 2023 ruling, the justices cautioned that courts shouldn’t “arrogate” power meant for state legislatures, yet they stopped short of drawing a hard line—a frustration for conservatives seeking clarity.
This isn’t the first time in 2025 that the Supreme Court has sidestepped a chance to weigh in on election disputes, as they also declined a similar petition from Montana earlier this year. It seems the justices are playing the long game, avoiding hot-button election cases for now.
Many on the right see this as a missed opportunity to protect legislative authority from judicial overreach, but perhaps it reminds them that they can’t win every battle in one swing. The Pennsylvania ruling stands, and thousands of voters will keep their Election Day lifeline—for better or worse.
