The US Supreme Court sided with a Pennsylvania Republican judicial candidate David Ritter who lost his race when undated mail-in ballots were counted along with ones that were properly completed.
In so doing, the court vacated a May ruling from the 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia that sided against Ritter. Ritter lost his 2021 campaign for a spot on the Lehigh County Court of Common Pleas to his Democrat opponent by just five votes, according to Reuters.
In that race, 257 absentee ballots were counted despite their being without a date written on the outer envelope of the mail-in ballot, as required by Pennsylvania law.
The 3rd Circuit had ruled that not counting such ballots would violate a provision in the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which states that minor ballot errors should not deny a citizen the right to vote. That court found that failing to include the date was “immaterial” to determining a voter’s qualifications to vote. Read more…
