New York’s highest court upheld a law Tuesday that allows ballots to be mailed in during the early voting period ahead of an election, soundly rejecting arguments from Republicans that the statute violates the state constitution.
The ruling means the mail-in voting option will be allowed in this November’s election and future elections in New York unless the law faces another legal challenge….
Republicans — led by U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik — had sued Democrats over the law, arguing that the state constitution requires voting to happen in person or by absentee ballot only for valid reasons.
The only exception to that rule prescribed by the state constitution, they had argued, was for voters who can’t physically make it to the polls due to reasons such as an illness, travel, medical procedure or military service.
All but one of the seven judges who sit on the state’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, disagreed with the Republican-led arguments in an opinion written by Chief Judge Rowan Wilson.
“Neither the parties’ arguments supporting those propositions, nor the legislative history are sufficient to overcome the very strong presumption of constitutionality,” Wilson wrote.