WASHINGTON — The Postal Service on Friday introduced a considerable reorganization meant to extend effectivity as Democratic lawmakers demanded an
WASHINGTON — The Postal Service on Friday introduced a considerable reorganization meant to extend effectivity as Democratic lawmakers demanded an inquiry into whether or not modifications by President Trump’s appointees may threaten the efficient use of mail-in ballots for the November election.
Louis DeJoy, the postmaster normal and a serious donor to Mr. Trump’s campaigns, was named to supervise the service in Could. On Friday, he shifted high personnel, together with some decades-long veterans of the Postal Service, and made modifications to its organizational construction.
“The brand new group will align features based mostly on core enterprise operations and can present extra readability and deal with what the Postal Service does finest; acquire, course of, transfer and ship mail and packages,” the Postal Service stated in a press release.
The modifications come at a time of heightened scrutiny for Mr. DeJoy, as critics cost that modifications to extra time insurance policies and different earlier actions threaten to sluggish supply of ballots when tens of millions of individuals are anticipated to vote by mail due to the coronavirus pandemic.
There are anecdotal studies across the nation of sluggish mail supply, and in New York Metropolis, hundreds of ballots in a Democratic main have been invalidated partially as a result of the publish workplace had not delivered a few of them in time.
In feedback on Friday to the Postal Service’s board of governors, Mr. DeJoy stated the modifications he had made — together with limitations on extra time — wouldn’t delay the well timed supply of ballots.
“Regardless of any assertions on the contrary, we’re not slowing down election mail or another mail,” Mr. DeJoy informed the board members. “As an alternative, we proceed to make use of a sturdy and confirmed course of to make sure correct dealing with of all election mail.”
That has not glad Mr. Trump’s Democratic adversaries on Capitol Hill, who’ve been vital of the modifications on the Postal Service and annoyed by Republicans’ refusal to supply billions of {dollars} in further funding for the company.
Seven Democratic members of Congress urged the inspector normal for the Postal Service to audit the brand new insurance policies imposed by the postmaster normal, saying they have been involved the modifications “pose a possible risk to mail-in ballots and the 2020 normal election.”
In a letter to the inspector normal, Tammy L. Whitcomb, the lawmakers referred to studies that Mr. DeJoy had restricted extra time pay and made different modifications that critics say have slowed mail supply and made it much less dependable.
The lawmakers urged Ms. Whitcomb to analyze the impact of the modifications on the supply of vital mail, together with remedy, paychecks and payments.
“These delays additionally pose a risk to the November election, significantly through the coronavirus pandemic when tens of millions of People are anticipated to decide on to vote by mail moderately than wait in lengthy traces on Election Day,” the lawmakers wrote.
The Democratic lawmakers who signed the letter have been Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Gary Peters of Michigan and Thomas R. Carper of Delaware and Representatives Carolyn B. Maloney of New York, Stephen F. Lynch of Massachusetts, Gerald E. Connolly of Virginia and Brenda Lawrence of Michigan.
Democrats, together with those that signed the letter, have charged that Mr. DeJoy is doing the bidding of the president, who has lengthy attacked the Postal Service on Twitter. In his remarks on Friday, Mr. DeJoy rejected that accusation.
“Whereas I actually have a very good relationship with the president of the USA, the notion that I’d ever make selections in regards to the Postal Service on the course of the president, or anybody else within the administration, is wholly off-base,” he stated. “I serve on the pleasure of the governors of the Postal Service, a gaggle that’s bipartisan by statute and that can consider my efficiency in a nonpartisan vogue.”