Gavin Newsom vows revenge on Supreme Court after mail-in ballot ruling

Gavin Newsom has vowed to fight the Supreme Court after it cleared the way for President Donald Trump to continue pursuing new restrictions on mail-in voting ahead of the midterms.

The California governor said in a statement late Monday he will launch another lawsuit against the federal government to try to block what he claimed were “Orwellian rules.”

The Supreme Court’s 6–3 decision was a major victory for Trump, with the justices lifting a lower-court injunction that had prevented federal agencies from moving forward with key portions of his order.

The case involves the president’s March executive order directing the DHS to compile state-by-state lists of citizens who are at least 18 and eligible to vote in federal elections.

The order also directed the US Postal Service to pursue new rules involving the processing of mail ballots.

Newsom said: “The Supreme Court just let the Trump administration move ahead (for now) with its plan to disenfranchise voters across the country. California will be suing AGAIN to block these Orwellian rules from being implemented.”

California Attorney General Rob Bonta, whose office is leading the legal challenge against the Trump administration, said Monday the state intends to challenge the federal actions as they are put into effect.

He said: “Today, the US Supreme Court opened the door for the Trump Administration to try to make it harder for Americans to vote. But today’s decision was not a ruling on the merits, and this fight is far from over.

“We will continue to use every legal tool at our disposal to fight back against unlawful federal overreach whenever it occurs,” he added.

The proposed changes triggered a meltdown from California and 22 other states, which argue the federal government is attempting to interfere with states’ constitutional authority to administer elections.

Bonta’s office claimed the Supreme Court found the states’ lawsuit was brought too early because the federal government had not yet taken all of the steps needed to implement the order. With federal agencies now moving forward, California says it plans to challenge those actions in court.

The stakes are particularly high in California, where about 80% of voters cast their ballots by mail in 2024, compared with roughly 30% nationwide.

The proposed federal rules could include new requirements involving ballot envelopes, voter lists and the way mail ballots are processed.

The Supreme Court stressed that Monday’s ruling does not mean those eventual rules will necessarily survive legal challenges.

The decision comes just weeks before ballots begin moving toward voters for the November midterm elections, leaving California election officials preparing for a legal fight over how — and whether — the federal government can impose new requirements on the state’s mail-voting system.

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