A legal expert is sounding the alarm over an impending Supreme Court decision on one of President Donald Trump's most recent appeals, calling it a critical test for democratic norms less than 100 days before the midterm elections.

Last week, the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to block a lower court from enjoining new rules that would prohibit the U.S. Postal Service from creating a national voter database and restrict the mailing of mail-in ballots only to individuals listed on that database. The Supreme Court could rule on the appeal as early as this week through its shadow docket, argued Joyce Vance, a former federal prosecutor and former U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, in a Substack essay.

The shadow docket refers to the Supreme Court's practice of issuing rulings on emergency requests and procedural matters without full oral arguments or extended written opinions, a mechanism that has increasingly been used for significant legal disputes in recent years. Election-related emergency appeals have become a recurring feature of the Court's shadow docket across multiple election cycles, often determining rules that govern voting procedures in the final weeks before voters cast ballots.

"This is going to be a key moment," Vance wrote.

The rules at issue stem from an executive order Trump signed earlier this year directing federal agencies to take on expanded roles in election administration, a move that sparked immediate legal challenges from voting rights groups and Democratic-led states. A lower court moved to block enforcement of provisions that would have empowered the U.S. Postal Service to compile voter data and control which individuals could receive mail-in ballots, prompting the administration's emergency appeal.

The timing of the appeal—filed fewer than 100 days before the midterm elections—signals that Trump is growing increasingly concerned about losing power, Vance argued. Mail-in voting has been a focal point of political and legal battles in the United States since the 2020 election, when a surge in absentee voting during the COVID-19 pandemic reshaped how millions of Americans cast their ballots and triggered ongoing disputes over ballot access, election security, and the role of federal agencies in election administration.

"However the Court rules, the fact that we are even here is the ultimate criticism of this administration," Vance wrote. "Under the Constitution, the choice of elected officials belongs to the people. Donald Trump is deathly afraid of what that means."

Vance emphasized that the case should not be treated as routine litigation.

"Efforts to circumvent the vote are inherently undemocratic and this shouldn't be treated like just another routine court case," she added. "The EO is not business as usual, and we should not treat it as though it is. It is a maneuver designed to wrest control from the people and place it in the hands of Trump and the privileged few powerful conservatives and wealthy oligarchs who have slid into (or written checks into) his favor, in hopes of controlling our future."