The Donald Trump Campaign and the Pennsylvania GOP won a huge victory today in their efforts to force the Bucks County, Pennsylvania, government to permit voters to request mail-in ballots in person.
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The campaign filed a lawsuit on Wednesday, documenting how county officials broke state law and turned away voters hours before the deadline (see Trump Campaign Suing Over Voter Suppression in Major Swing State). This was after video surfaced of a police officer and skeevy individuals, some later identified as local Democrat activists, wearing “Voter Protection” badges but with no visible identification credentials shutting down the line at 1:45 p.m. when the law required the line to stay open to 4:30 p.m.
UPDATE: 2024 Election
Bucks County PA — Police Officer BLOCKS THE DOOR as voters were in line at 4:38pm ET
They were not allowed in and told to fill out requests, per @charisedwardss
Again, this is direct violation to what Govenor Josh Shapiro stated.
If you have any issues,… https://t.co/OVY1NK5TtL pic.twitter.com/m9vnYXCBKh
— MJTruthUltra (@MJTruthUltra) October 29, 2024
The lawsuit, filed in Common Pleas Court, maintains county officials ignored guidance from the Pennsylvania Department of State that anyone in those lines by 5 p.m. Tuesday — the deadline for requesting a mail ballot — should have been able to file their request.
Instead, the suit alleges, voters were repeatedly turned away — in some cases as early as 2:30 p.m. — as queues grew so long outside the county’s administration building and satellite election offices that it would take staff the rest of the office’s hours of operations to work through them.
“Instead of complying with the letter and spirit of the Election Code, as well as the directive from the Secretary of the Commonwealth, the board ordered security officials to remove some voters … some of whom had been standing in line for hours only to be turned away,” wrote Wally S. Zimolong, a GOP election lawyer representing the campaign in their suit.
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DISENFRANCHISEMENT: At least 50 voters in Levittown, PA at the Lower Bucks Government Services Center were denied the opportunity to vote in person today. Throughout the afternoon, certain individuals paced the line of voters making statements like “oh the lines really long we… pic.twitter.com/zhuCEgCBWq
— Paul Giblin 🇺🇸🗑️ (@dreamlessod) October 29, 2024
Bucks county today 2:30pm
Line closed at 2:00 pic.twitter.com/UWdpFRsatV— Harry Tiffany IV (@harrytiffanyiv) October 28, 2024
A county judge has extended the deadline by one day to make up for the premature closure of lines.
The Bucks County Court of Common Pleas issued the one-day deadline extension on Wednesday after a lawsuit filed by the Trump campaign.
The deadline in Pennsylvania to apply for a mail-in ballot was 5 p.m. on Tuesday, but the special injunction extends that deadline by 24 hours in Bucks County.
The injunction comes after the Trump campaign filed a lawsuit against the Bucks County Board of Elections.
The court order agreed with the suit, saying that Bucks County violated the state Election Code when it turned away voters who were in line before the 5 p.m. deadline Tuesday.
Security officials removed some voters who had been in line for hours before the deadline, the court ruled.
PENNSYLVANIA LAWSUIT VICTORY
We just won the Trump Campaign/RNC lawsuit against Bucks County, PA.
We will now have extended early in-person mail-voting through November 1st — three extra days.
We will keep fighting. Go vote! Stay in line!
— Michael Whatley (@ChairmanWhatley) October 30, 2024
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There is no indication of any interest on the part of the State of Pennsylvania in why a uniformed police officer and seemingly unauthorized persons countermanded Governor Josh Shapiro’s instructions and state law.
This is the second case in Pennsylvania where early voting has been obstructed, and the courts have stepped in to extend voting deadlines.
