Supreme Court will hear challenge to late-arriving ballot laws in March

The Supreme Court announced on Friday that it will hear arguments in a challenge to late-arriving ballot laws in March, in a case that could have wider implications for election procedures in multiple states this November.

The justices will hear arguments in Watson v. Republican National Committee on March 23. The case looks at whether state laws allowing the counting of mail ballots postmarked by Election Day but received afterward violate federal law. In the Watson case, the justices are considering the legality of a Mississippi law that allows mail ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted if received up to five days later.

The central question in Watson will be whether the federal law, which sets Election Day as the first Tuesday after the