Trump's mail-in voting restrictions blocked nationwide by federal judge

A federal judge on Tuesday expanded an earlier block on part of President Trump's executive order seeking to tighten rules for mail-in voting ahead of November's elections.

Why it matters: The ruling freezes a key piece of Trump's attempted overhaul of mail-in voting for all U.S. states.

A previous ruling in a separate case had limited a block for the 23 Democratic states that sued over the president's order.

Trump's executive order had enabled the USPS to refuse to deliver ballots to states that did not cooperate with the Postal Service on preventing what the administration has claimed is rampant voting by noncitizens .

The order had included directives for states to work with the USPS to create lists of confirmed U.S. citizens who were eligible to vote so the Postal Service would not deliver ballots to would-be voters not on the list.

U.S.

District Judge Indira Talwani ruled back in June that Congress had not given the USPS authority to regulate mail-in voting.

What's new: Talwani's preliminary injunction on Tuesday bars the federal government from enforcing the order's mail-voting provisions for the Nov.

3 midterms or any earlier federal election.

This includes refusing to transmit mail-in or absentee ballots and pursuing regulations outlined in the order.

It does not prevent the government from issuing nonbinding USPS guidance on ballot-mail envelopes.

Zoom in: In her ruling, Talwani said the order was "causing confusion and threatening both increasing chaos and an erosion of trust in our democracy." She said protecting voters "heavily outweighs the executive's attempt to unconstitutionally insert itself into the domain of election regulation." With less than 90 days until the midterms, Talwani said an injunction was critical to prevent the administration "from changing election rules on the eve of the election." Representatives for the White House and USPS did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.

Flashback: Federal judge blocks Trump's mail-in voting order Editor's note: This story has been updated with additional content throughout.