Federal judge shoots down request to halt mail-in ballot changes in North Carolina

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (CN) — Voting organizations will not be able to stop mail-in ballot changes from going into effect for the midterm elections in North Carolina, a federal judge ruled Monday evening.

North Carolina Alliance for Retired Americans, North Carolina Asian Americans Together, Down Home North Carolina and two voters sued the state board of elections and two county election boards in September, claiming last-minute changes to the absentee ballot process would disenfranchise voters.

The state now requires local election officials to verify signatures and disqualify otherwise valid ballots that are not sealed in an inner envelope, a change that was adopted on Sept. 4, just hours before the state became the first to mail out ballots for the midterm elections.

The organizations argued before U.S. District Judge Thomas Schroeder last week that changes to the ballot acceptance process would place an undue burden on voters and asked him to pause implementation of the changes until after the November election.

In a 72-page opinion, the George W. Bush appointee declined to intervene. The plaintiffs waited 18 days after the state elections board adopted the new changes to file suit — a delay Schroeder called “significant.”

“At a minimum, the merits are far from ‘clear-cut,’ plaintiffs have delayed in seeking the relief they now seek, and implementing the changes sought is infeasible at this stage in the midst of voting,” Schroeder wrote in his order.

Local county boards of elections have already begun sorting through absentee ballots and spoiling those that fail to adhere to the challenged requirements.

Any burden from the new requirements is “modest,” Schroeder said, and voters who have their ballots spoiled still have other options to cast a vote.

“The absentee voter who fails to seal his or her ballot correctly has an opportunity to correct a mistake, and is not barred from participating in early voting or voting on Election Day,” Schroeder said. “Likewise, the voter whose signature is rejected for ‘clear evidence’ that it is not their name has an opportunity to submit another ballot, participate in early voting, or vote on Election Day.”

The plaintiffs have failed to show there are extraordinary circumstances that would warrant an injunction, he added, nor have they thus far showed they are likely to win their case.

“Neither of the two challenged provisions, which are clearly stated on the absentee ballot materials — that the voter sign his or her own name and place their ballot in a sealed envelope provided by the county board of election — is burdensome, much less unduly so,” he said.

Prior to the changes, a ballot in an unsealed inner envelope would be counted. The state, which has required voters to show IDs to vote since 2023, also requires absentee voters to fill out their ballot in front of two witnesses and include a copy of their photo ID.

An injunction could cause confusion for voters and local election boards, the state board of elections warned in court last week, adding the changes are intended to protect the integrity and secrecy of the ballots, and the signature verification confirms the person requesting the ballot is the one who filled it out.

County election boards are instructed to presume a signature is the voter’s unless there is clear evidence to the contrary, the state board of elections said in its brief — even if the signature is illegible. The plaintiffs contended that most voters with spoiled ballots don’t recast them and that not all voters whose ballots are spoiled for forgetting to seal the inner envelope will have enough time to request a new ballot and have it be counted by Election Day.

Over 40,000 North Carolina residents have cast their ballots by mail already, and nearly 150,000 absentee ballots have been requested. The state also began in-person early voting last week.

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