On October 22, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a stay in Scanlan v Coalition for Open Democracy, 26A512. The vote was 8-1. The issue was whether the Secretary of State’s original directives about using student ID’s should be modified. Here is the Court’s ruling. The dissenter is Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
The 2026 session of the New Hampshire legislature had changed the law to delete student ID’s from the list of acceptable ID’s that enable individuals to register to vote, and to vote at the polls. The U.S. District Court upheld the law, but it directed the Secretary of State to revise his instructions to the public. Although the law isn’t clear, it appears that a student ID might still be useful if a voter had no other ID, and the District Court directed the Secretary of State to revise his instructions to say that. The U.S. Court of Appeals declined to interfere with the U.S. District Court order. But now the U.S. Supreme Court has blocked the order of the U.S. District Court, on the basis that the change came too close to the election and therefore could cause confusion.