If Monday’s Supreme Court arguments are any indication, the endless election might have had its day.
In two hours of arguments, the justices heard the Republican National Committee’s arguments for tossing a Mississippi election law that established a grace period for mail-in ballots to come in and still be counted, as long as they are postmarked by Election Day, according to CBS News.
At issue is whether that violates the federal law that sets a specific calendar day for federal elections.
According to multiple news accounts, the court’s conservatives were skeptical that the law passes muster.
BREAKING: SCOTUS Justice Sam Alito just DROPPED THE MIC on liberals who want us to receive endless mail-in ballots after election *day*
“We have LOTS of phrases that involve two words, the last of which, the second of which is DAY. Labor DAY, Memorial DAY, George Washington’s… pic.twitter.com/rA7gKMPafz
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) March 23, 2026
“We have lots of phrases that involve two words, the last of which, the second of which, is ‘day,’” Justice Samuel Alito said.
“Labor Day, Memorial Day, George Washington’s birthday, Independence Day, birth day, and Election Day. And they’re all particular days.
“So, if we start with that, if I have nothing more to look at than the phrase ‘Election Day.’ I think, ‘This is the day in which everything is going to take place, or almost everything.’”
Alito raised the possibility that counting ballots that come in after Election Day can give rise to the appearance of fraud if those ballots were enough to swing an election, NBC reported.
Conservative Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh also had concerns about the Mississippi law, according to NBC.
The three liberal justices, however, appeared to lean against the court’s involving itself in the issue at all, according to The Hill.
How justices phrase their questioning during oral arguments is not necessarily an indicator of how they will vote in the case at hand, but it can be a hint of how they’re leaning. And if Monday’s questioning is any guide, the court’s conservative majority may be poised to strike down the Mississippi law.
According to the Supreme Court-watching SCOTUSblog, the case before the court is Watson v. Republican National Committee. The court is being asked to decide whether federal laws relating to the election of presidents, senators, and U.S. representatives “preempt” Mississippi’s law.
Federal Election Day has been established by Congress as the first Monday after the first Tuesday in November in even-numbered years. However, the law is silent about administrative details.
That means policy decisions, such as Mississippi’s law accepting mail-in ballots up to five days after the polls actually close, should be left up to the states, liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said, according to The Associated Press.
Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett — typically two conservative votes — appeared concerned that striking down the Mississippi law could lead to invalidating state laws that allow early voting, according to CBS.
Solicitor General D. John Sauer, arguing for the Trump administration in support of the RNC’s challenge to the law, said the administration agreed that “early voting is still acceptable,” CNN reported.
Every justice asked at least one question regarding early voting, according to CBS, indicating all shared a concern about a practice that has grown almost universal in the country.
As Americans voted for president in 2024, only Alabama, Mississippi, and New Hampshire had no provisions for voting early, according to a CBS News report from the time.
At one point in the arguments, Alito seemed to indicate impatience with even that.
“We don’t have Election Day anymore. We have election month, or we have election months,” Alito said, according to CBS News.
“The early voting can start a month before the election, the ballots can be received a month after the election.”
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