(as well as Secretary Boockvar’s authorization of this procedure) will be upheld
unless it has no rational basis.115
Individual Plaintiffs’ claims fail because it is perfectly rational for a state to
provide counties discretion to notify voters that they may cure procedurally
defective mail-in ballots. Though states may not discriminatorily sanction
procedures that are likely to burden some persons’ right to vote more than others,
they need not expand the right to vote in perfect uniformity. All Plaintiffs have
alleged is that Secretary Boockvar allowed counties to choose whether or not they
wished to use the notice-and-cure procedure. No county was forced to adopt
notice-and-cure; each county made a choice to do so, or not. Because it is not
irrational or arbitrary for a state to allow counties to expand the right to vote if they
so choose, Individual Plaintiffs fail to state an equal-protection claim.
Moreover, even if they could state a valid claim, the Court could not grant
Plaintiffs the relief they seek. Crucially, Plaintiffs fail to understand the
relationship between right and remedy. Though every injury must have its proper
redress,116 a court may not prescribe a remedy unhinged from the underlying right
being asserted.117 By seeking injunctive relief preventing certification of the
Pennsylvania election results, Plaintiffs ask this Court to do exactly that. Even
115
116
117
Biener, 361 F.3d at 215.
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137, 147 (1803).
Gill, 138 S. Ct. at 1934 (“A plaintiff’s remedy must be tailored to redress the plaintiff’s
particular injury.”) (citing Cuno, 547 U.S. at 353).
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