[LS]

First, the ballots are sequestered, don’t get counted until everything else is counted, and then they are checked in other ways. Second, it is entirely likely the issue was the timeframe, not the question of validation. We’ll see.

[Braak]

Folks..I think we just saw the death of the United States as we know it. And not a shot fired....at least, not yet.

[twigs]

Thanks for some sanity. Do we know the count from the SOTUS? I’m interested in Roberts and Alito.

[kesg]

First, the ballots are sequestered, don’t get counted until everything else is counted, and then they are checked in other ways. Second, it is entirely likely the issue was the timeframe, not the question of validation. We’ll see.

That was my reaction as well. The lower court had ordered her to install a computer system by today to help local election officials. Brunner probably argued that this was physically impossible. The SCOTUS probably said, in effect, "fine, but sequester those ballots and treat them as merely provisional until you validate that the registrations were valid." I guess we will know more soon.

[kesg]

Here is a link to the actual ruling, which is very short. It essentially says that the court sufficiently doubts that a private litigant (the Ohio GOP) can enforce the voting law to justify a temporary restraining order requiring the Ohio SOS to obey that law. This doesn’t change what I said before, which is that she will have to count these ballots as merely provisional until they are verified — she still has to obey that law even if the GOP may not be able to get a federal court to force her to do it.