Oct. 24 (UPI) — Pennsylvania county election officials must count provisional ballots cast by voters whose mail-in ballots were rejected due to errors, the state’s highest court ruled, handing the Republican National Committee another defeat in its effort to prevent certain votes from being counted.
The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania issued its 4-3 ruling Wednesday in a case that was filed in April by two voters whose provisional ballots were rejected by the Butler County Board of Elections after their original mail in ballots were disqualified for missing the inner secrecy envelope.
The case made its way to the high court after the Republican National Committee and the Pennsylvania Republican Party appealed a lower court’s September decision, which found that Butler County officials were required to count the provisional ballots.
In the ruling Wednesday, Justice Christine Donohue wrote that as there were no disqualifying irregularities with the provisional ballots, they were to be counted.
“While appellants and their amici argue that ‘election integrity’ mandates that electors’ provisional ballots not be counted, we are at a loss to identify what honest voting principle is violated by recognizing the validity of one ballot cast by one voter,” Donohue wrote for the majority.
“If appellants presume that the General Assembly intended to disqualify the provisional ballot of a voter who failed to effectively vote by mail in order to punish that voter, we caution that such a construction is not reconcilable with the right of franchise.”
Ben Geffen, senior attorney at the Public Interest Law Center, which filed the original lawsuit along with the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, celebrated Wednesday’s ruling as reinforcing the right to vote in the state.
“Today’s decision affirms that if you make a paperwork mistake that will keep your mail ballot from counting, you have the right to vote by provisional ballot at your polling place on Election Day,” Geffen said in a statement.
The ruling comes as the Republicans have been seeking to limit the counting of some votes through litigation that opponents have described as an effort to disenfranchise legitimate voters.
On Monday, judges in Michigan and North Carolina rejected a Republican attempt to have certain overseas and military absentee ballots thrown out.
Republicans have also sought to purge voter rolls through lawsuits.
