Minnesota Tuesday became one of 14 states filing a lawsuit to stop changes at the U.S. Postal Service. The announcement comes the day Postmaster General Louis DeJoy published a letter saying changes would be delayed until after the election.
Postal service workers have expressed frustration and concern about the future of the post office.
With mail sorting machines decommissioned and mailboxes removed from streets, they say their ability to process mail has been significantly reduced, they’re concerned about customers getting their social security checks, prescriptions and packages on time -- not to mention handling a surge of mail-in ballots.
“These letter carriers are out there, they’re part of the community, they enjoy what they do,” Joel Malkush, president of the St. Paul Letter Carriers Union, said. “Every day that they’re out there, they want to do the best job they can and get the mail out to customers. Right now they feel a little bit hampered with that.”
In a statement announcing the suit, Minnesota Attorney General Ellison called changes at the USPS a “deeply disturbing” “attack.” The complaint states: “The ‘transformative’ changes DeJoy has implemented are both procedurally and substantively unlawful.”
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Todd Elkerton, head of the St. Paul Local of the American Postal Workers Union, estimates that with seven sorting machines removed, that equates to up to 5 million pieces of mail not being sorted each day.
The USPS sent a letter in July to 46 states, including Minnesota, that some ballots could risk not being counted due to slowdowns. Elkerton said employees know how important ballots are.
“I know these postal workers and these carriers have been trained to recognize that and we’re going to make it a priority that your vote counts,” he said. “Even on primary day we found three ballots in the plant that were supposed to be in Rochester and we delivered them down to Rochester so they wouldn’t have to wait until Thursday to get them counted. We’re going to go the extra mile to make sure in this state your absentee ballots are counted.”
DeJoy is set to testify in front of the Senate Friday on mail delays. Sen. Tina Smith, who toured the Eagan USPS facility today, offered where her questions would begin.
“Why is he doing this now in the middle of a global pandemic while we have the most important election in my lifetime less than three months away,” Smith said. “The second question is, ‘What are his conflicts of interest as a significant investor in businesses that compete with the Post Office at the same time that he’s taking steps, arguably to damage the service?’ I want to know what that’s about.”
DeJoy, a Trump donor, divested his UPS stock, but does own Amazon stock options.
His letter stated: “The Postal Service is ready today to handle whatever volume of election mail it receives this fall. He said Mail processing equipment and blue collection boxes will remain where they are and No mail processing facilities will be closed.”
President Trump last week in a Fox News interview admitted to delaying stimulus funding for the USPS to affect mail-in voting. Yesterday he tweeted “SAVE THE POST OFFICE” in all-caps.