Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Election Day deadline for absentee ballots in Michigan upheld

Michigan primary voting

Primary voting in Michigan in March, before the coronavirus surge. Now the state is expecting a big increase of mail voting.

Elaine Cromie/Getty Images

Michigan's Court of Appeals has rejected a voting rights group's bid to make the battleground state count absentee ballots that arrive after Election Day.

The decision upholds a state law, similar to those on the books in 33 other states, that says only envelopes that are in the local clerk's office by the time the polls close will be tabulated.

The 2-1 ruling Wednesday came in a lawsuit brought by the League of Women Voters. The group said it would appeal to the state Supreme Court, setting up the likelihood the rule will be either relaxed or solidified by November — when the counting of a surge of mailed ballots arriving at close to the last minute could decide the allocation of 16 electoral votes.


Many states and localities are trying to shift to more mail voting because of the coronavirus pandemic. And during the primaries one consistent theme has been absentee ballots not counted because they arrived at the election office too late.

At least 130,000 such envelopes have arrived too late to be counted in primaries so far, and thousands more have been disallowed for other flaws — a 1 percent rejection rate that, while minimal in the abstract, could prove decisive in close contests.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

A surge in remote voting seems certain this year in Michigan, not only because of Covid-19 but also because it is the first presidential election in which Michiganders do not need to provide an excuse to obtain an absentee ballot — which is now the case in all but 16 states.

The lawsuit, filed in May, asked the courts to make the state count votes that were postmarked by Election Day and arrived as long as six days after the election. The plaintiffs argued the current law violated voters' voting rights under the state Constitution.

The appeals court said it was up to the Legislature to change the deadline.

The lawsuit also argued that voters' should not have to pay postage to return absentee ballots. But the appeals court said the burden of finding and affixing a stamp was small and therefore allowed the state to make voters pay for it. (Only 16 states front the cost of postage.)

Read More

Bridging Hearts in a Divided America

In preparation for U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's second inauguration in Washington, D.C., security measures have been significantly heightened around the U.S. Capitol and its surroundings on January 18, 2025.

(Photo by Celal Gunes/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Bridging Hearts in a Divided America

This story is part of the We the Peopleseries, elevating the voices and visibility of the persons most affected by the decisions of elected officials. In this installment, we share the hopes and concerns of people as Donald Trump returns to the White House.

An Arctic blast is gripping the nation’s capital this Inauguration Day, which coincides with Martin Luther King Jr. Day. A rare occurrence since this federal holiday was instituted in 1983. Temperatures are in the single digits, and Donald J. Trump is taking the oath of office inside the Capitol Rotunda instead of being on the steps of the Capitol, making him less visible to his fans who traveled to Washington D.C. for this momentous occasion. What an emblematic scenario for such a unique political moment in history.

Keep ReadingShow less
King's Birmingham Jail Letter in Our Digital Times

Civil Rights Ldr. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. speaking into mike after being released fr. prison for leading boycott.

(Photo by Donald Uhrbrock/Getty Images)

King's Birmingham Jail Letter in Our Digital Times

Sixty-two years after Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s pen touches paper in a Birmingham jail cell, I contemplate the walls that still divide us. Walls constructed in concrete to enclose Alabama jails, but in Silicon Valley, designed code, algorithms, and newsfeeds. King's legacy and prophetic words from that jail cell pierce our digital age with renewed urgency.

The words of that infamous letter burned with holy discontent – not just anger at injustice, but a more profound spiritual yearning for a beloved community. Witnessing our social fabric fray in digital spaces, I, too, feel that same holy discontent in my spirit. King wrote to white clergymen who called his methods "unwise and untimely." When I scroll through my social media feeds, I see modern versions of King's "white moderate" – those who prefer the absence of tension to the presence of truth. These are the people who click "like" on posts about racial harmony while scrolling past videos of police brutality. They share MLK quotes about dreams while sleeping through our contemporary nightmares.

Keep ReadingShow less
The arc of the moral universe doesn’t bend itself

"Stone of Hope" statue, Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, Sunday, January 19, 2014.

(Photo by Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

The arc of the moral universe doesn’t bend itself

“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s familiar words, inscribed on his monument in Washington, D.C., now raise the question: Is that true?

A moral universe must, by its very definition, span both space and time. Yet where is the justice for the thousands upon thousands of innocent lives lost over the past year — whether from violence between Ukraine and Russia, or toward Israelis or Palestinians, or in West Darfur? Where is the justice for the hundreds of thousands of “disappeared” in Mexico, Syria, Sri Lanka, and other parts of the world? Where is the justice for the billions of people today increasingly bearing the brunt of climate change, suffering from the longstanding polluting practices of other communities or other countries? Is the “arc” bending the wrong way?

Keep ReadingShow less
A Republic, if we can keep it

American Religious and Civil Rights leader Dr Martin Luther King Jr (1929 - 1968) addresses the crowd on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington, Washington DC, August 28, 1963.

(Photo by PhotoQuest/Getty Images)

A Republic, if we can keep it

Part XXXIV: An Open Letter to President Trump from the American People

Dear President Trump,

Keep ReadingShow less