WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected an emergency appeal to remove Robert F. Kennedy Jr. from the presidential ballot in two battleground states.

Kennedy wanted to get off the ballot in Wisconsin and Michigan after dropping his independent bid and endorsing Republican Donald Trump in the tight contest. He argued that keeping him on violated his First Amendment rights by wrongly implying he still wanted to be elected president.

Michigan and Wisconsin said removing his name now, with early voting underway days before the election, would be impossible. More than 1.5 million people in Michigan have already returned absentee ballots, and another 264,000 have voted early, state attorneys wrote in court documents. In Wisconsin, over 858,000 people have returned absentee ballots.

The justices did not detail their reason in an order rejecting the emergency appeal, as is typical. One justice, Neil Gorsuch, publicly dissented in the Michigan case.

— The Associated Press