The Daily Fuckup

On April 19, 2021, the Supreme Court declined to hear the final remaining Pennsylvania election challenge, leaving the lower court ruling in place. The case was Bognet v. Degraffenreid, filed by former Republican congressional candidate Jim Bognet and other plaintiffs after the 2020 election. It centered on Pennsylvania’s rules for mail ballots, including the deadline for receiving them.

The justices’ action was brief and procedural. By denying review, the court did not reopen the dispute or create any new legal path for the challengers. It left the earlier decision intact and closed out the petition at the Supreme Court level.

Bognet’s case was part of the broader wave of post-election litigation that followed the 2020 presidential vote in Pennsylvania and other states. But this petition was not brought by the Trump campaign. It was a separate challenge from individual plaintiffs who were trying to invalidate or alter the treatment of certain Pennsylvania mail ballots.

By the time the court acted, the election had long been certified and the state’s results were final. The remaining question in this case was narrower: whether the Supreme Court would take up a dispute over Pennsylvania ballot rules that lower courts had already resolved. It did not.

That left the last Pennsylvania election-related case at the end of the road, with the lower court ruling still controlling and no further Supreme Court review available in the matter.