Biden's Nearly 2M Mail-In Pennsylvania Votes in 2020 Would Now Be 'Unconstitutional'

In Pennsylvania, in the 2020 presidential election, President Joe Biden received nearly 2 million mail-in votes, which according to a new court ruling, would be "unconstitutional" for future elections.

On Friday morning, a Pennsylvania state court struck down the state's 2019 law that expanded mail-in voting. The ruling comes after former President Donald Trump and his allies have questioned the legitimacy of the election, filing numerous court cases. At one point, Trump claimed to have "massive proof" of voter fraud in the state.

According to the Pennsylvania Election Returns' website, Biden received 1,995,691 mail-in votes to Trump's 595,538. Biden won the state and its 20 electoral votes with 50.1 percent of the vote to Trump's 48.84 percent.

During the run-up to the election, Pennsylvania was a hotly contested state. Winning there helped secure Trump's victory in 2016 over Hillary Clinton. Before 2020, the Keystone State had not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 1988.

Following Friday's news, Trump praised the ruling, writing, "Big news out of Pennsylvania, great patriotic spirit is developing at a level that nobody thought possible. Make America Great Again."

Trump, a vocal opponent of mail-in voting, said in April of 2020, that the voting method leads to "a lot of people cheating." However, a recent study from the scientific journal Risk Analysis said that the increase in mail-in voting did not put the safety of the election at risk.

Democratic Governor Tom Wolf's office told Newsweek in a Friday statement: "The Administration will immediately appeal this decision to the state Supreme Court and today's lower court ruling will have no immediate effect on mail-in voting pending a final decision on the appeal.

"The Republican-controlled legislature passed Act 77 with strong bipartisan support in 2019 to make voting more safe, secure, and accessible and millions of Pennsylvanians have embraced it.

"The simple fact is that despite near-unanimous Republican legislative support for this historic update to Pennsylvania election law, they now want to strip away mail-in voting in the service of the "big lie."

"The strength of our democracy and our country depends on eligible voters casting their ballot and selecting their leaders. We need leaders to support removing more barriers to voting, not trying to silence the people."

In a statement to Newsweek on Friday's ruling, the Pennsylvania Department of State said, "The Department of State disagrees with today's ruling and is working to file an immediate appeal to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court."

In a second statement to Newsweek on Friday, it added: "The Department of State has a simple message today for Pennsylvania voters: Today's ruling on the use of mail-in ballots has no immediate effect on mail-in voting. Go ahead and request your mail-in ballot for the May primary election.

"Voters who are on the annual mail ballot list might recently have received in the mail, or will soon receive, the annual application from their county. They should complete and return the application to affirm that they want their county to send them a mail ballot for all 2022 elections.

"Additionally, the Department is notifying all county election boards that they should proceed with all primary election preparations as they were before today's Commonwealth Court ruling. There should be no change in their procedures.

"Since mail-in ballots were first made available by historic bipartisan legislation, more than 4.7 million of these ballots have been cast by Pennsylvania voters. The Department stands by the use of this secure, convenient and accessible method of voting."

Newsweek reached out to the White House but has not heard back.

Update 01/28/22, 4:34 p.m. ET: This article was updated with additional comment from the Pennsylvania Department of State.

Correction 01/28/22, 12:35 p.m. ET: This article was corrected to say that a Pennsylvania state court struck down the 2019 law, not the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.