With fewer than 35 days until the Nov. 3 election, Pennsylvania's recently changed mail-in ballot rules may face a challenge in the Supreme Court.

Two top state Republican lawmakers filed a motion with the nation's top court Monday, asking it to stay the Pennsylvania Supreme Court's decision requiring election officials to count mail-in ballots received after Election Day.

The application, filed by state Senate Pro Tem Joe Scarnati, R-25th, and Majority Leader Jake Corman, R-34th, asks that the high court halt that earlier ruling. The state Republican Party also filed a similar application.

Throughout the motion, lawyers for the two lawmakers argued that the state court's decree violated the Elections Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees state legislatures the ability to regulate the “time, date and place” of elections. They claimed that decision sows “chaos into the electoral process mere weeks before the already intricate” election.

“In a year where there is a very real possibility that the final presidential election result hinges on Pennsylvania, the new rules imposed by the decision of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania (—) a body elected in partisan politics (—) could destroy the American public's confidence in the electoral system as a whole,” the application states.

While the General Assembly did alter the commonwealth's mail-in and absentee ballot rules last October, and again modified them in March in response to COVID-19, those changes only extended the deadline for ballots to be received to 8 p.m. on Election Day and adopted no-excuse absentee voting. It was instead the state high court's ruling that extended the ballot reception deadline to three days following the election.

Additionally, the state court ruled that the ballots arriving after Election Day need not have a postmark “unless a preponderance of the evidence demonstrates” the ballot was mailed after Nov. 3.

The state Supreme Court further decided that voters could use drop boxes in lieu of mailing ballots and that poll watchers could not oversee precincts outside of the county of their residence. Neither the lawmakers' nor the party's application challenges either of these rulings.

Catherine Lalonde, Butler County Democratic Committee chairwoman, argued that the appeal to the Supreme Court is superfluous, saying recent problems with the U.S. Postal Service need a response by elections officials.

“It just gives people a little extra time to get it in, especially with postal delays,” she said. “They're only giving it three days. It could affect Republicans as much as Democrats.”

Al Lindsay, the county Republican committee chairman, could not immediately be reached for comment Tuesday.

The nation's top court has ruled on other, similar cases in recent months during the wind-up to an election unlike any before seen in the United States. In most cases, the lawmakers' application says that the court has sided with state legislators, rather than with state courts.

The pleading alleges that the result of the state court's ruling would likely be different from that of other states that allow ballots to be received after Election Day, so long as it is postmarked prior.

“This is an open invitation to voters to cast their ballots after Election Day, thereby injecting chaos and the potential for gamesmanship into what was an orderly and secure schedule of clear, bright-line deadlines,” it says.