Federal judge rejects Republican challenge of Mississippi absentee vote counting

U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola over the weekend rejected a challenge by the Republican National Committee and others to Mississippi’s practice of counting mail-in absentee ballots received up to five days after Election Day. 

Guirola, a senior-status judge first appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush, ruled in a 24-page opinion that the political parties had legal standing to bring the suit, but disagreed with their claim that Mississippi’s statute clashed with federal law. 

“Mississippi’s statutory procedure for counting lawfully cast absentee ballots, postmarked on or before election day, and received no more than five business days after election day is consistent with federal law and does not conflict with the Elections Clause, the Electors’ Clause, or the election-day statutes,” Guirola wrote. 

The state and national Republican parties, a Harrison County election commissioner and the state Libertarian Party were the plaintiffs in the litigation and argued that Guirola should strike down Mississippi’s five-day window because only Congress gets to determine regulations for federal elections. 

Conor Woodfin, the attorney representing the GOP, and Rusell Nobile, an attorney representing the state Libertarian Party, did not immediately respond to requests for their response to the ruling and whether they plan to appeal it to the conservative Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. 

MaryAsa Lee, a spokesperson for Fitch’s office, told Mississippi Today in a statement that the Attorney General’s office is “pleased that, with less than 100 days until Election Day, the court upheld our absentee ballot law.”

The law in question is a 2020 state law passed by the Legislature amid the COVID-19 pandemic that allows local election workers to process mail-in absentee ballots for up to five days after an election. The law only permits workers to count the mail-in votes if the ballots were postmarked by the election date. 

Both chambers of the GOP-majority Legislature voted in favor of the bill, and Republican Gov. Tate Reeves signed it into law. 

The suit put Secretary of State Michael Watson, the named defendant, in the peculiar situation of arguing with his own political party in federal court and defending a law passed by a Republican-supermajority Legislature by using attorneys from Republican Attorney General Lynn Fitch’s office.  

The litigation comes at a time when voter confidence in elections is at an all-time low and when candidates have started to dispute election results more frequently. 

If the plaintiffs appeal the litigation, a prompt resolution before November’s presidential and congressional election would be vital. The appellate process is lengthy and time-consuming, and different rulings from the district and appellate courts could lead to voter confusion. 

Mississippians can request an absentee ballot application starting September 6, and the earliest day they can vote by absentee is September 23, according to the secretary of state’s elections calendar.