A federal judge ruled Monday that President Donald Trump's administration violated her court order blocking new mail-in ballot restrictions, after officials made contradictory claims to different courts within weeks of each other.

U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani found that the Trump-governed U.S. Postal Service defied her preliminary injunction by quietly finalizing a rule implementing Trump's executive order on mail-in ballots just days earlier. The rule was sent to the Federal Register on August 21, despite Talwani's explicit order barring the agency from "initiating or completing" any such rulemaking.

"Defendants violated the preliminary injunction in this case," Talwani wrote.

The rule would prohibit the delivery of mail ballots in states that have not turned over extensive information about who is and is not voting by mail on their voter rolls to the federal government. It is already facing lawsuits from two dozen states and voting rights organizations.

The administration argued that it had not technically violated the order because the Final Rule says USPS will not enforce it for the 2026 election unless the injunctions are lifted.

Talwani was not persuaded, particularly in light of what the administration told the Supreme Court just weeks earlier in a separate but related case. In a July 27 filing, government lawyers complained about "every day that the agencies are unable to take steps to carry out the Executive Order as to the November 2026 election". The Supreme Court accepted that argument and granted a stay in the related case on August 24, one day before Talwani's ruling.

Although she found a violation, Talwani declined to impose any meaningful penalty. She ruled that the relief plaintiffs requested would not materially change anything, since the rule already states that it has no effect on the 2026 election while her injunction remains in place.

Talwani did say that the plaintiffs, led by the League of Women Voters of Massachusetts, could amend their complaint to challenge the newly finalized rule directly, because what had previously been a hypothetical threat is now a completed government action.

The ruling adds to a series of court findings this year accusing the Trump administration of skirting judicial orders on voting rights, even as the broader legal fight over the president's authority to regulate mail-in ballots continues in appeals courts nationwide. The latest order also underscores how the dispute is moving in parallel through district courts and the Supreme Court, leaving the underlying rule subject to ongoing legal challenges while its effect on the 2026 election remains blocked for now.

On Monday, the Supreme Court gave Trump a partial win by reversing one of the injunctions against the executive order, but the other remains in effect for now.