How the Supreme Court is handling election cases

Between the lines: Most of the court’s pre-election rulings were not fully formed, precedent-setting Supreme Court decisions. They’ll have clear and direct bearing on the election, but they didn’t reach many firm legal or constitutional issues.

In Pennsylvania, for example, the court let an extended deadline stand but did not definitively rule on whether that extension was legal. It could revisit the issue if Pennsylvania’s results are in dispute.

The court seemed to want to avoid changing whatever deadline was in effect, so close to Election Day and with voting already under way, said Josh Douglas, an election-law expert at the University of Kentucky.

What they’re saying: “The Court has shown that it is very sensitive to the fundamental issue of voter reliance,” Biden campaign legal adviser Bob Bauer told Axios. If people vote the way authorities have told them to vote, “it seems highly unlikely that Court is going to retroactively authorize discarding thousands of votes.”