In big win for voters, court permanently blocks key parts of Trump’s first anti-voting executive order

A federal judge Wednesday permanently blocked several key parts of President Donald Trump’s 2025 anti-voting executive order. 

The ruling, which found that the order exceeded Trump’s authority, turns earlier temporary blocks into final relief for Democratic-led states fighting the administration’s attack on free elections.

U.S. District Judge Denise Casper dealt a major blow to Trump’s first anti-voting executive order, permanently enjoining provisions that would have forced new proof of citizenship requirements onto federal voter registration forms, restricted military and overseas voters and pressured states to reject ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but arrive after.

Several parts of the order had already been halted in separate lawsuits, and Casper temporarily halted major pieces of the order last year. 

But Wednesday’s decision is significant because it makes that relief permanent in the multi-state case and adds lasting protections against funding threats and mail ballot restrictions for the states covered by the lawsuit.

The case, brought by Democratic-led states, challenged Trump’s March 2025 executive order — Trump’s first major attempt in his second term to seize power over election rules that the Constitution gives to states and Congress. 

Since then, Trump has issued a second executive order on elections attacking mail-in voting, which is being implemented and challenged in separate lawsuits.

In Wednesday’s opinion, Casper ruled that the challenged provisions went beyond the president’s authority.

The challenged provisions are “unconstitutional and void because they are ultra vires and violate the separation of powers under the United States Constitution,” Casper wrote. “The Court DECLARES that § 2(a) of the Executive Order is inconsistent with the NVRA, and that § 3(d) of the Executive Order is inconsistent with UOCAVA.”

The National Voter Registration Act, or NVRA, is a pro-voting law that governs voter registration rules for federal elections. UOCAVA, the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, protects voting access for military members and U.S. citizens living abroad.

The order would have directed the Election Assistance Commission (EAC), an independent federal agency created by Congress, to require documentary proof of citizenship on the federal mail voter registration form. Voting rights advocates have warned that such requirements can block eligible voters who do not have easy access to citizenship documents.

The court also blocked a provision that would have required the secretary of defense to change the Federal Post Card Application, the form used by military and overseas voters, to require documentary proof of citizenship and proof of eligibility to vote in a particular state.

Those proof of citizenship provisions had already been blocked in a Washington, D.C. lawsuit. But Wednesday’s ruling makes the block permanent in the multistate case as well, reinforcing that the president cannot unilaterally rewrite federal voter registration forms.

The ruling also blocks, for most of the plaintiff states, a provision that would have directed the EAC to withhold federal election funds from states that did not accept and use the federal voter registration form with Trump’s proof of citizenship requirement. That funding threat had previously been blocked for Washington state and Oregon in a separate case, but Wednesday’s order expands protection in the lawsuit to the other plaintiff states except Wisconsin.

The court excluded Wisconsin from that part of the ruling because the state does not use the federal voter registration form and the plaintiff states did not show that Wisconsin would be specifically harmed by the provision.

Casper also permanently blocked provisions targeting states that count some mail ballots received after Election Day, as long as those ballots were cast on time under state law. The injunction applies to the plaintiff states with extended mail ballot receipt deadlines, including Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York and Rhode Island.

Trump’s order claimed that federal Election Day laws require mail ballots to be received by Election Day, not just cast by then. Courts have rejected that theory, which threatens longstanding state laws allowing timely mailed ballots to arrive within a short grace period after Election Day.

“The undisputed record shows that disqualifying ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but arrive thereafter would disproportionately harm military voters, elderly voters, voters with disabilities and voters in rural areas, all of whom face unique obstacles to mailing access and service,” Casper wrote. “This harm is compounded by the potential of delays in delivering timely-mailed ballots.”

The court warned that eliminating post-Election Day cure periods, which allow voters to fix minor ballot issues, would risk disenfranchising tens of thousands of voters.

The issue is also before the U.S. Supreme Court in Watson v. Republican National Committee, a Mississippi case asking whether federal law allows states to count mail ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but arrive afterward.

Wednesday’s ruling is the latest in a string of court losses for Trump’s March 2025 elections order. 

The Trump administration has appealed multiple rulings, and the legal fight is not over. 

But the Massachusetts decision cements another major defeat for an executive order that sought to override state election rules, impose new barriers to registration and pressure states to abandon mail ballot protections before the 2026 midterms.