On Friday (Dec. 11), Pennsylvania Republicans asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review their lawsuit. The lawsuit alleges that the state allows anyone to vote by mail, a move that violates the Constitution.
Last month, Republicans such as U.S. Rep. Mike Kelly and congressional candidate Sean Parnell filed a lawsuit over a state law enacted last year.
The lawsuit says that “Act 77 was unlawfully implemented and is the most sweeping and fundamental change to Pennsylvania’s voting laws to date” and that this law “is yet another attempt to unlawfully override the restrictions on absentee voting imposed by Pennsylvania’s Constitution by not first following the necessary procedures to amend the Constitution to allow for expanded voting scope.”
A Pennsylvania judge said the plaintiffs would likely win their case and prevent the state from certifying the results of the Nov. 3 election. But days later, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court denied the injunction, leading to an appeal of the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Earlier this week, the U.S. Supreme Court denied the plaintiffs’ petition for immediate judicial relief.
In response, the petitioner filed an emergency petition for an injunction or immediate stay (enjoining certification of the election results) to file and process a petition for writ of certiorari pending certification, allowing the federal Supreme Court to review the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s decision.
Gregory Teufel, lead counsel for the petition for review, said in a statement, “The fundamental framework of our democracy prohibits vote dilution and the devaluation of core constitutional elements. Procedural maneuvers aside, the core issue in this case is that Act 77 is unconstitutional under the Pennsylvania Constitution, and therefore it also violates the U.S. Constitution.”
Teufel denounced the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for “shirking its most basic responsibility” of determining whether a state law violates the state Constitution.
He also said that if left unresolved, the core issues raised in the lawsuit will “continue to affect this and all future national elections. Therefore, the petitioner respectfully requests that our nation’s highest court take up this case expeditiously.
The applicant’s previous request to the U.S. Supreme Court to block certification of the Pennsylvania election results was denied, but the Court did not provide any reasoning or a clear dissenting opinion.
The denial of said request does not prevent the court from accepting the petition for review.
“All that has happened is that we have not obtained relief from a temporary injunction.” Rep. Kelly said this week, “but this case is still ongoing.”
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