Republican National Committee v. Democratic National Committee: Reinterpreting the Court’s Role in Election Law Challenges

Carly L. Brody

In Republican National Committee v. Democratic National Committee, the Supreme Court of the United States addressed whether the date prescribed by Wisconsin law to receive absentee ballots in the State’s April 2020 primary election could be extended in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic (“COVID-19”). Many voters who timely requested their ballots did not receive their ballots in time to return them before the statutory deadline. COVID-19 created an unprecedented late surge in absentee ballot requests that overwhelmed election officials and resulted in a backlog of sending ballots to voters. The lower federal courts granted a six-day extension for receiving absentee ballots, considering when the ballots would be “received by” as the only relevant inquiry. On appeal, the Supreme Court focused on when the ballots would be “received by” and “postmarked by,” and weakened the lower courts’ remedy by requiring that ballots received up to six days after the election also be postmarked by election day. The Court decided the case by narrowly focusing on the notion that lower federal courts should not change election rules close to an election, while failing to properly weigh other election-specific considerations. The Court’s reasoning in Republican National Committee laid the groundwork for more emergency judicial decisions by lower courts as the 2020 General Election approached, which relied on the same reasoning and unfortunately precipitated further confusion and disenfranchisement in the midst of a public health emergency. In light of these repercussions, this Note argues that (1) the Court should not have intervened in the Wisconsin dispute, and that by doing so, the Court threatened its legitimacy; (2) the Court improperly considered the timing of the election by relying on the Purcell principle as a rigid rule and by applying it in a way that contradicted the principle’s purpose; (3) the Court emphasized the timing of the election while neglecting to fully account for the election law’s burden on voters; and (4) the dissent’s reasoning insufficiently assessed the constitutional analyses required in deciding election-related challenges.