A federal judge dealt a significant blow to the Trump administration's push to reshape mail-in voting on Thursday. The rebuke blocked the primary pillars of a presidential order that critics said would have handed Washington unprecedented control over how millions of Americans cast their ballots.

U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani concluded in a 37-page ruling that President Donald Trump did not have the constitutional authority to regulate state elections as he attempted to do through a March executive order. 

Per MS Now, the order would’ve directed the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration to build a nationwide citizenship list, while also pushing USPS to deliver absentee ballots only to voters who appeared on federally approved rosters.

“The Constitution does not grant the President any specific powers over elections,” Talwani, an Obama appointee, wrote.

The ruling landed just one day after Postmaster General David Steiner confirmed before a Senate panel that USPS planned to withhold mail ballots from states that refused to turn over their voter data to the federal government — a statement that alarmed election experts and Democratic lawmakers across the country.

The ruling is the latest in a string of judicial blows to the Trump administration's efforts to impose federal control over American elections, something the Constitution leaves to Congress and the states. 

The administration is likely to appeal the ruling.