In February, Center for Election Confidence (CEC) and its partner organizations, the American Legislative Exchange Counsel (ALEC), Honest Elections Project (HEP), and Restoring Integrity and Trust in Elections (RITE), filed a Supreme Court amicus brief in Watson v. RNC (24-1260), a key election integrity case considering whether federal uniform Election Day statutes require all ballots to be returned by Election Day. Today, the Court heard oral argument in Watson, with several Justices adopting key lines of argumentation from the brief CEC filed with its partners.

In the brief, CEC and its partner organizations warned of the danger of state acceptance of late-arriving ballots to the operation of the federal government and the threat that “recall” tools offered by USPS, UPS, FedEx, and other common carriers present to the idea that mail ballots are cast and “final” upon mailing. Justices, including across standard ideological lines, devoted a significant portion of their time to questions on these themes, pulling out specific points and statutory argumentation from the organizations’ brief.

In particular, CEC and its partner organizations argued that “late ballot schemes will continue to delay results, threaten Congress’s ability to convene a full membership or to certify Electoral College results, foster confusion, increase opportunities for fraud, deny the right to vote, and undermine confidence in federal elections” and that any ability to “recall” ballots would “enable all sorts of mischief: ballots could be recalled
(already possible under Mississippi law), postmarks could be ignored, and private parties could hold on to votes for an indefinite time after Election Day”, pointing out that Mississippi law—despite the State’s argument to the contrary—plainly does not prohibit such recall.