Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/20a66_new_m6io.pdf
Page Number: 16.0

Cite as:  592 U. S. ____ (2020) 

11 

KAVANAUGH, J., concurring 

are capable of meeting the deadline but fail to do so.  See 
Rosario, 410 U. S., at 757–758.  In other words, reasonable 
election  deadlines  do  not  “disenfranchise”  anyone  under 
any legitimate understanding of that term.  And the dissent 
cannot  plausibly  argue  that  the  absentee-ballot  deadline 
imposed—and  still  in  place  as  of  today—in  most  of  the 
States is not a reasonable one.  Those voters who disregard 
the deadlines or who fail to take the state-prescribed steps 
for meeting the deadlines may have to vote in person.  But 
no  one  is  disenfranchised  by  Wisconsin’s  reasonable  and 
commonplace  deadline  for  receiving  absentee  ballots.    In-
deed, more than one million Wisconsin voters have already 
requested, received, and returned their absentee ballots.   
  To  help  voters  meet  the  deadlines,  Wisconsin  makes  it 
easy to vote absentee and has taken several extraordinary 
steps  this  year  to  inform  voters  that  they  should  request 
and return absentee ballots well before election day.  
  For starters, as the Seventh Circuit aptly noted, Wiscon-
sin has “lots of rules” that “make voting easier than do the 
rules of many other states.”  Luft v. Evers, 963 F. 3d 665, 
672  (2020).    Wisconsin law  allows  voters to  vote  absentee 
without  an  excuse,  no  questions  asked.    Wis.  Stat.  §6.85 
(2017–2018).    Registered  voters  may  request  an  absentee 
ballot by mail, e-mail, online, or fax.  Wisconsin Elections 
Commission,  Absentee  Voting,  https://elections.wi.gov/ 
voters/absentee.  
  Since  August,  moreover,  the  Wisconsin  Elections  Com-
mission has been regularly reminding voters of the need to 
act early so as to avoid backlogs and potential mail delays.  
See, e.g., Wisconsin Elections Commission, Wisconsin Vot-
ing Deadlines and Facts for November 2020 (Aug. 20, 2020), 
http://elections.wi.gov/node/7039.    In  August  and  Septem-
ber, for example, Wisconsin’s chief elections official explic-
itly  urged  voters  not  to  wait  to  request  a  ballot:  “It  takes 
time for Wisconsin clerks to process your request.  Then it 
may take up to seven days for you to receive your ballot in