Trump appeals to the Supreme Court again in the dispute over postal voting

USA-NewsblogTrump appeals to the Supreme Court again in the dispute over postal voting

September 3, 2026, 11:29 p.m.|

A federal judge stopped the president's plans to tighten the rules on postal voting. He now wants to have this decision suspended shortly before the midterm elections.

All developments in the live blog

In addition to our own research, we use material from the news agencies dpa, Reuters, epd, KNA and Bloomberg for our live blog.

Important updates

Rubio: Opposition leader Machado can return to Venezuela

“Lake America”: Apple also follows Trump’s renaming

Dispute over trans people in the military: Trump goes to the Supreme Court

Reports of a dispute with Minister Hegseth: State Secretary of the US Army submits his resignation

Supreme Court lets Trump continue construction of White House ballroom

Trump appeals to the Supreme Court again in the dispute over postal voting

In the legal dispute over stricter rules for postal voting, President Donald Trump's government has again appealed to the Supreme Court. She asked the court to suspend a lower court decision that has so far prevented her from implementing the new rules. Less than two months before the important midterm elections, the Trump administration is asking the US Supreme Court to make a quick decision with its urgent application. In the state of North Carolina, the first postal voting documents are to be sent out as early as this Friday. The Supreme Court had previously overturned another injunction against Trump's plans - albeit for procedural reasons. He did not decide on the legality of the project.

The new rules essentially stipulate that the US Postal Service (USPS) will play a central role in controlling postal voting. States should submit the design of their envelopes for postal voting to the post office for approval. In addition, the postal service should only deliver the documents to citizens who are listed on a voter register provided by the states. Republicans defend the plans with the argument that they want to prevent alleged election fraud. Critics suspect that Trump's motive is that he wants to make voting by mail more difficult and thus disadvantage Democratic voters.

A federal judge stopped Trump's plans last week with an injunction. The president's order is "a likely unconstitutional regulation that is virtually impossible to comply with in light of the 2026 midterm elections," she wrote. It is also unrealistic to implement it so shortly before the election.

Lucia Geier

Court in Missouri overturns redistricting that was advantageous for Republicans

The Supreme Court of the US state of Missouri has overturned a new redistricting drafted by the Republicans for the November congressional elections. The ruling is a setback for the party in its struggle to maintain its slim majority in the US House of Representatives. The decision could allow longtime Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver to return to the House of Representatives. His constituency in Kansas City was dissolved as part of the redistricting.

The court found that the state's Republican secretary of state, Denny Hoskins, had unlawfully prevented a referendum on redistricting. Republican lawmakers pushed through the redistricting as part of a campaign supported by President Donald Trump to change the district boundaries in favor of their own candidates. Republicans secured a national advantage after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling allowed several conservative Southern states to carve up districts with high percentages of black voters.

Plane carrying US minister made emergency landing – engine failed

Due to a failed engine, a plane with US Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin on board had to make an emergency landing in the capital Washington. “The U.S. Coast Guard pilots made the single-engine landing seem like a routine affair,” Mullin wrote on Platform X. After landing, the pilots told Mullin that it was their first emergency landing. “We couldn’t have been in better hands.”

A total of 14 people were in the machine, according to a report from the local media DMV Live News, which Mullin shared on X. Accordingly, the right engine failed halfway, whereupon the plane was diverted to Washington. It initially remained unclear what the flight's destination was. “No panic, just pure professionalism,” Mullin praised the pilots.

Rubio: Opposition leader Machado can return to Venezuela

According to Foreign Minister Marco Rubio, the USA is not standing in the way of the return of Venezuelan opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado to her home country. She is a Venezuelan citizen and has “every right to travel to her country whenever she wants to return,” Rubio said in an interview in Spanish.

In December, the politician, who had been living underground until then, secretly left Venezuela to personally accept the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo. Shortly thereafter, Washington carried out a military operation in Venezuela and captured President Nicolás Maduro. Washington is now working closely with Acting President Delcy Rodríguez. Machado is not taking part in talks between the government and the opposition, which are supported by Washington.

The politician has repeatedly declared her intention to return to her country. After the devastating earthquakes that shook the country in June, she said she would be in Venezuela soon. However, according to media reports, the US government at the time considered such a step to be inappropriate. So far, Machado has not returned.

“Lake America”: Apple also follows Trump’s renaming

Following Internet giant Google, Apple has now renamed Lake Ontario "Lake America" in its map app, adopting a requirement from US President Donald Trump. If you search for Lake Ontario on Apple Maps in the USA, you will be led to the lake on the border with Canada - but the new name "Lake America" ​​is now emblazoned there. The iPhone manufacturer thus followed the controversial renaming that Trump had ordered in the customs conflict with the neighboring country.

However, the change only affects Apple users in the USA, while the name Lake Ontario will continue to be displayed in Canada, as the Canadian broadcaster CBC reported. German users will see the name Lake Ontario. Google had also made a similar regulation for its popular Maps function, where the new name has been displayed for a few days - in Germany both names can be seen on Google Maps.

Trump wants acting Navy Secretary Cao as a permanent solution

After many personnel changes in the leadership of the US Department of Defense, President Donald Trump has made a proposal for permanent leadership of the Navy. Hung Cao, who has been running the business on an interim basis since April, will hold the position of Secretary of the Navy permanently, as Trump announced on his Truth Social platform. “I can’t think of anyone better suited than him,” Trump said. The Senate still has to approve Trump's proposal.

Former Undersecretary Cao had already taken office on an interim basis at the end of April after John Phelan resigned from the post. At the time, the ministry did not provide any information about the reasons for the change. As the New York Times reported, tensions had been simmering for months between Phelan and his two superiors, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and his deputy, Stephen Feinberg.

Dispute over trans people in the military: Trump goes to the Supreme Court

President Donald Trump's administration has gone to the Supreme Court in the legal dispute over the dismissal of trans people from the US military. A spokeswoman for the German Press Agency confirmed that a corresponding application had been received by the court. However, it is not yet clear whether the Supreme Court will accept the case.

In 2025, at Trump's behest, the Defense Department ordered that trans people be largely excluded from military service. Lower courts had blocked this for the time being, but a final judgment is still pending. Trump's request to the Supreme Court in the capital Washington aims to remove these members of the armed forces from service before a verdict is made.

The court at first instance was convinced that the exclusion of trans people violated the constitutional requirement that all people be treated equally before the law. The directive, named after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, is based “at least in part on an impermissible state interest in harming the politically unpopular group of transgender people,” the statement said. In its application to the top judges, the US government described this as a “serious wrong decision”. The ability of the armed forces to decide for themselves who is allowed to serve in the military is a matter of exceptional importance.

Trump campaigned for the exclusion of trans people from the military during his first term in office and is now tightening the rules again. He claims the military has been plagued and weakened by a “radical gender ideology.”

No shutdown in midterms: US interim budget passed

The US budget is unlikely to become a pawn in the election campaign before the general elections in November. After the Senate, the second chamber of parliament, the House of Representatives, also voted with a large majority for an interim budget that will finance government business until mid-December. President Donald Trump still has the opportunity to intervene - or sign the law.

Majority of Americans against Trump's Canada policy

A majority of Americans reject President Donald Trump's punitive tariffs on Canadian goods and the renaming of Lake Ontario to "Lake America." This emerges from a new survey by the opinion research institute Ipsos for the Reuters news agency. According to the three-day survey, which concluded Sunday, just 20 percent of respondents supported higher tariffs on Canadian goods, while 57 percent opposed it. Renaming the lake was met with even greater opposition: Only 14 percent of Americans supported the move and 63 percent opposed it.

Trump administration: More lax fuel economy standards for cars are coming soon

The US government under Donald Trump has confirmed that it will significantly weaken the stricter requirements of the previous government of Joe Biden for the gasoline consumption of cars. The new standards will be announced shortly, Transport Minister Sean Duffy said on Monday, without giving details. Trump had already announced a significant easing in December and declared: "People want gasoline engines."

Automakers expect Duffy's plan to be similar to the NHTSA's December proposal. It proposed a fleet-wide average of 34.5 miles per gallon (14.7 km per liter) by 2031, which corresponds to the common conversion in Germany of around 6.8 liters per 100 kilometers. Under the previous administration of Joe Biden it was 50.4 miles per gallon, which meant around 4.7 liters per 100 kilometers.

The NHTSA has estimated that its proposal should reduce the cost per new vehicle by $930 each. However, the proposal would also lead to a significant increase in fuel consumption and cost US citizens around $185 billion in additional gas money by 2050.

Biden, who was replaced by Trump in January 2025, had his sights set on reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and fossil fuel consumption. He said he wanted to accelerate the transition to clean energy and make the US a global leader in clean energy technologies and manufacturing. At the same time, he wanted to encourage car manufacturers to build more electric cars. Environmentalists have argued that the Trump administration is imposing higher costs on drivers at the pump to benefit the oil industry.

Ulrike Putz

Trump announces further agreements to reduce drug prices

US President Donald Trump announced new agreements to lower drug prices with several pharmaceutical companies on Monday. The companies include the Australian CSL, the Indian Sun Pharmaceutical and the Belgian pharmaceutical company UCB, as Trump announced at a meeting in the White House. The companies have agreed to offer medicines for the state health program Medicaid at most favored nation conditions. This is a “tremendous discount that should significantly reduce the cost of medical care,” Trump said.

However, it is unclear how many drugs the agreements cover and how much the savings will actually be for the state or patients. The White House did not release details. Critics such as the consumer protection organization Public Citizen expressed skepticism. The new agreements are a diversionary tactic from the administration's failed plan to reduce US drug prices to the level of other rich countries. Under current law, Medicaid already receives large discounts from manufacturers.

The background is that consumers in the USA pay significantly more for prescription drugs than in most other industrialized nations. The government had already reached similar agreements with 17 of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies last year, including Pfizer, Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk. The current announcement comes before the midterm elections in November, which will decide the majority in Congress. The Israeli generic drug manufacturer Teva said it was still in talks with the government.

Ulrike Putz

Reports of a dispute with Minister Hegseth: State Secretary of the US Army submits his resignation

According to media reports, the State Secretary responsible for the US Army, Daniel Driscoll, has submitted his resignation. This was reported by the channels CNN and Fox News, citing unnamed sources. Driscoll, who served as a close confidant of Vice President J.D. Vance only held the office for a year and a half. In recent weeks there has been speculation about his impending departure.

The army, the largest division