CONTACT:
Allison Janowski
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Chicago, IL – Last night, a federal judge for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois denied Congressman Mike Bost’s challenge to Illinois’ Ballot Receipt Deadline Statute. Bost filed this suit against the State Board of Elections ahead of last year’s election in an attempt to prevent the counting of mail-in-ballots received after Election Day. The lawsuit could have invalidated thousands of mail-in ballots, including those of military members serving overseas, if they are postmarked on or before Election Day but received after.
The Chicago Tribune reported that the judge didn’t “just [reject] the three Republicans’ standing to file suit, Kness explicitly ruled that Illinois’ 2015 law complied with the U.S. Constitution as well as federal election law.”
“This ruling by a Trump-appointed judge is a win for voting rights and a loss for those who wish to suppress fairly counted votes to suit their political ambitions. Despite their bad faith effort to undermine free and fair elections, this ruling shows the lack of legal standing Republicans have in challenging laws that protect our right to vote. The Illinois GOP knows how wildly out of touch they’ve become with Illinoisans, but fortunately, their effort to override the will of the voters with this baseless lawsuit rather than accepting the results of our elections was as unsuccessful as their campaigns,” said Democratic Party of Illinois Chair Lisa Hernandez.
As attacks on voting rights and unsubstantiated claims of fraud continue to marr our elections, Illinois’ Democratic leaders have taken steps to expand voting access, protect voters, and secure elections. Governor JB Pritzker and leaders in the General Assembly successfully expanded voting protections by making election day a state holiday, establishing permanent vote by mail registries, increasing access to curbside voting, establishing a central polling location in counties across the state, extending hours at permanent polling places, strengthening cybersecurity standards for election authorities in Illinois, and providing viable voting opportunities for justice-impacted individuals.
You can read the full opinion here.
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