Postal Partisan Politics -- Trump and Voter Suppression

The United States Postal Service has emerged as a central figure in the 2020 election as President Donald Trump steps up attacks on the agency as part of his crusade against voting by mail in November amid the coronavirus pandemic – including saying he won’t fund it in order to hinder its ability to deliver mail-in ballots.

Trump – who has falsely claimed that mail-in ballots lead to voter fraud even though he himself has repeatedly cast absentee ballots in Florida – said that he did not want to give the Postal Service money because it would then be able to deliver mail-in ballots to voters across the country.

(Clarissa-Jan Lim and Ryan Brooks. “The US Postal Service Is Now A Trump Target In The 2020 Election. Here's What's Going On.” BuzzFeed News. August 15, 2020.)

The postal dealings are so shady and intentional. Trump appointed Louis DeJoy, a businessman and top Trump donor, postmaster general and CEO of the USPS in early May, much to the alarm of Democrats and ethics watchdogs.

DeJoy came into the USPS with little related experience and a lot of red flags. In 2014, his company, New Breed Logistics, was bought by transportation and logistics company XPO Logistics, a USPS contractor. DeJoy sat on XPO’s board and still held a large equity stake in the company when he became postmaster general, CNN reported, raising a potential conflict of interest.

Lim and Brooks report …

“He also owned between $100,000 and $250,000 in Amazon stock when he was appointed to the USPS. Though he divested those shares in June, DeJoy also bought between $50,000 and $100,000 in stock options for Amazon, CNN reported, raising questions about why he would be investing in a competitor to an agency he leads. (Amazon has its own delivery network that carries non-Amazon packages, as well as its own.) Sen. Elizabeth Warren has called for an investigation into DeJoy’s purchase of Amazon stock options.

“DeJoy has raised millions for Republicans and held fundraisers for Trump and the RNC. In 2019, he was named the finance chair for the 2020 Republican National Convention, a job that involved leading fundraising for the planned convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. The convention has since been largely moved out of the state because of the coronavirus and Trump’s feud with North Carolina’s Democrat governor.

“DeJoy has already made broad changes to the Postal Service in the few months that he has served as postmaster general, shuffling leadership around and instituting large cost-cutting measures, including prohibiting employees from working overtime, telling them to leave mail behind if it slows down their route, and removing mailboxes around the country. The USPS, under pressure, reportedly said that it would suspend the removal of mailboxes.

“DeJoy’s appointment to the USPS has led to concern that the Trump administration is attempting to further exert control over the independent agency. Dimondstein said the union is concerned that DeJoy’s appointment was intended to undermine the Postal Service 'to pave the way for a privatization agenda.'”

(Clarissa-Jan Lim and Ryan Brooks. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/clarissajanlim/trump-post-office-usps-election-funding.)

In Congress, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other congressional Democrats (including a handful of Republicans) wrote a letter to DeJoy voicing their concerns about the changes to Postal Service operations. They say …

“If implemented now, as the election approaches, this policy will cause further delays to election mail that will disenfranchise voters and put significant financial pressure on election jurisdictions.”

On August 12, Rep. Carolyn Maloney introduced a bill  to roll back changes that had been introduced at post offices. Maloney said …

“Our Postal Service should not become an instrument of partisan politics, but instead must be protected as a neutral, independent entity that focuses on one thing and one thing only -- delivering the mail. Millions of people rely on the Postal Service every day to communicate, to access critical medications, and to vote.”

Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., chair of the House subcommittee on government operations, said Trump is acknowledging that he wants to hold up funding for the U.S. Postal Service to hinder Americans from voting. Connolly reported …

“The president admits his motive for holding USPS funding hostage is that he doesn’t want Americans to vote by mail. Why? It hurts his electoral chances. He’s putting self-preservation ahead of public safety, for an election he deserves to lose.”

Democratic nominee Joe Biden told reporters that the president’s unwillingness to approve funding for the USPS was “pure Trump.”

“He doesn’t want an election,” he added.

Biden’s campaign released a statement Thursday declaring …

“The President of the United States is sabotaging a basic service that hundreds of millions of people rely upon, cutting a critical lifeline for rural economies and for delivery of medicines, because he wants to deprive Americans of their fundamental right to vote safely during the most catastrophic public health crisis in over 100 years.”

(Deb Riechmann and Anthony Izaguirre. “Trump Says He Opposes Additional U.S. Postal Funding That Would Help Anticipated Mail-In Ballot Surge.” Time. August 13, 2020.)

NAACP President Derrick Johnson told BuzzFeed News that “this is the most blatant attempt to suppress voters in modern history at least since the voter suppression tactics of the 1960s.”

Democrats have pushed for $10 billion in all for the Postal Service in talks with Republicans on a huge COVID-19 response bill. That figure, which would include money to help with election mail, is down from a $25 billion plan in a House-passed coronavirus measure.

Democrats are insisting on emergency aid to the beleaguered Postal Service and to state and local election agencies that expect to be flooded with mail-in ballots. Their well-founded fear is that with the mail slowed, ballots won't arrive in time to be counted, and millions of Americans will be disenfranchised.

That concern compounded on August 14 when, the Postal Service informed many states that they could not guarantee the timely delivery of ballots this fall.

The Truth is Self-Evident

Trump is undermining the post office to increase his reelection chances. For months, he has been loudly proclaiming, without evidence, that widespread mail-in voting would lead to "massive fraud." In doing so, Trump has been pre-spinning the election results, setting up what could be a winter of litigation and turmoil centered around the counting of mail-in ballots.

Trump said out loud and on national television, that he intends to destroy the United States Postal Service in an attempt to stop people from voting safely during a pandemic. Trump's own words on August 13:

“If we don’t make a deal (his view of stimulus aid) that means they (Democrats) don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting. They just can’t have it. Sort of a crazy thing.”

Trump is practicing voter suppression. His “deals” are not about reform or compromise. His warnings of mail-in ballots being crooked are lies meant to frighten and prejudice voters. Trump's tactics – and those of DeJoy – are AGAINST supporting voters’ rights to state laws, their rights to receive a ballot, and their rights to return it through the mail during a global pandemic.

Think of it. The president of the United States has simply declared his intent to meddle with free and fair elections in this country. His grifting strategy is evident – do the corruption in the open so that somehow people might think it's “above-board.”

Jack Holmes, Politics Editor at Esquire, said it so well …

“The Republican Party's record has been clear for going on a decade: stop people who don't vote Republican from voting at all. Now they're just telling you straight up. The United States has never been a full democracy, but in the Year of Our Lord 2020, the Party of Lincoln is working overtime – and publicly debasing itself – to make that problem worse, not better. Just another national disgrace.”

(Jack Holmes. “The President Has Openly Declared He’s Destroying the Post Office to Suppress Votes.” Esquire. August 13, 2020.)