Federal law would reject mail ballots arriving after polls close
S. 5355 — Ballots by Election Day Act · Filed by James Lankford (R-OK) · 1 cosponsor · Introduced Aug 6, 2026 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill changes federal election law. Mail-in ballots for federal elections must arrive by Election Day. Polls close at the end of Election Day. Military and overseas voters keep their current rights. The rule would start in 2027.
Who it affects
Voters who mail ballots would be affected. Many states now let mail ballots arrive after Election Day. This bill would stop that.
One thing to notice
Military and overseas voters can still mail ballots late. Other voters cannot. This creates two different rules.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
1 cosponsor: 1 Republicans.
- Aug 6, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Aug 6, 2026 — Referred to Senate Committee on Rules and Administration · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Words to know
- mail-in ballots — Votes that people send by mail instead of voting in person
- federal elections — Elections for president, Senate, and House of Representatives
- Election Day — The day when people vote in federal elections
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (2,029 characters) on Aug 21, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 14,707 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
As of — page rendered 2026-09-23.
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