Pennsylvania’s mail-in voting legislation is upheld once more, as court docket guidelines in opposition to Republican problem

HARRISBURG, Pa. — A Pennsylvania state court docket on Tuesday rejected the most recent Republican effort to throw out the presidential battleground state’s broad mail-in voting legislation that has develop into a GOP goal following former President Donald Trump’s baseless claims about election fraud.

It is the most recent of a number of refusals by a state court docket to invalidate Pennsylvania’s 2019 mail-in voting legislation, enacted barely months earlier than the COVID-19 pandemic started and Trump started attacking mail-in voting.

In the lawsuit filed final 12 months, 14 present and former Republican state lawmakers contended that the court docket should invalidate the legislation as a result of two earlier court docket selections triggered a provision written into it that claims it’s “void” if any of its necessities are struck down in court docket.

Those selections, they argued, refused to implement a requirement {that a} voter handwrites a date on the outer envelope of their mail-in poll if the poll is to be counted.

But the Commonwealth Court, in a 24-page opinion, unanimously discovered that the court docket selections didn’t invalidate “the dating provision” of the legislation. It dismissed the lawsuit, in favor of Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration and the nationwide and state Democratic events.

Greg Teufel, the lawyer for the 14 Republican lawmakers, mentioned he expects to enchantment to the state Supreme Court, which has twice upheld the mail-in voting legislation in opposition to earlier Republican-backed challenges.

In an interview, Teufel mentioned he disagreed with the court docket’s rationale, saying that the court docket is ignoring the plain language of the legislation.