A Massachusetts federal judge, siding with Democratic attorneys general who contended the action was unconstitutional, effectively nullified President Trump's attempted sweeping reforms to the US electoral process.

The March presidential decree, stipulating documentary proof of citizenship for voter registration, validating only absentee ballots received by election day, and mandating states adhere to novel deadlines as a precondition for federal election subsidies, was defended by the White House as instrumental in ensuring "free, fair, and honest elections."

However, Judge Dean J. Casper, positing the high likelihood of states prevailing in legal action, asserted that the Constitution does not vest the President with *ad hoc* electoral authority; this ruling concomitantly blocked aspects of the order mandating state rejection of absentee or postal ballots received post-Election Day.

This marks the second legal setback to President Trump's executive order, compounding a prior judicial impediment enacted by a Washington D.C. judge against portions of the same decree.