How the conservative Supreme Court has rewritten the rules for the midterms

With the November 3 midterms about two weeks away, the conservative-majority Supreme Court has already shaped how the contest will be run, through rulings on redistricting, campaign spending, noncitizen voter checks and mail ballots. Many of those outcomes have helped Republicans. In April, a 6-3 majority drastically weakened the Voting Rights Act's protections for minority voters, which set off fresh map-drawing in states under Republican control. This month, the justices also made it easier for parties to spend heavily on television ads in close races, according to CNN.

The court has not sided with the GOP every time. It turned down President Donald Trump's attempt to let the US Postal Service hold back mail ballots, and none of his three appointees dissented. In June, a 5-4 majority also allowed states to accept mail ballots that arrive shortly after Election Day.

Justice Elena Kagan, who wrote the dissent in the April case, said at a Catholic University event that the court has ignored the damage its rulings do to American democracy. Jason Snead of the Honest Elections Project dismissed that as spin. Samuel Spital of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund countered that the harm to democracy reaches well past November.

Summarized by PolitiKool from CNN’s reporting. Read the full story at CNN →