New York’s battle over moving local elections to even-numbered years has reached the U.S. Supreme Court, putting a closely watched federal lawsuit that includes Riverhead on hold for now.
A petition asking the nation’s high court to hear a challenge to New York’s even-year election law has been distributed for the justices’ March 20 conference, meaning the court is now set to decide whether it will hear a case over one of the most consequential election changes in New York in decades.
The law moves most local elections from odd-numbered years to even-numbered years, when voters are already going to the polls for state and federal races.
Supporters say the change will increase voter turnout in local elections, which typically draw far fewer voters in odd-numbered years. Opponents say it will bury local issues under higher-profile national and statewide campaigns and weaken local control.
The legal challenge now before the Supreme Court stems from a state-court fight over the law that began in Onondaga County. The challengers won there, but the state prevailed on appeal, first in the Appellate Division and then in October 2025 in the New York Court of Appeals, which upheld the law.
The petition now before the nation’s highest court was filed Jan. 13 by Rockland County and other challengers and docketed Jan. 15.
The Supreme Court’s involvement has already affected a separate federal lawsuit challenging the same law, brought by the New York Republican State Committee, local Republican committees and several Republican-led towns, including Riverhead.
A pre-motion conference in that case that had been scheduled for Monday in U.S. District Court in Central Islip has now been adjourned.
In an order entered Friday, U.S. District Judge Gary R. Brown adjourned the March 9 conference and directed the parties to provide a status update after the Supreme Court decides whether to grant the review.
In a March 5 letter to Brown, lawyers from the state attorney general’s office said the Supreme Court petition raises federal constitutional questions that overlap with issues in the federal case. They asked the judge to postpone the conference until the high court decides whether it will take up the case.
Riverhead joined the federal lawsuit in October, after the state’s highest court upheld the law.
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