Discrimination Against Mails

 

Blitheringly incompetent, malevolent political operative, liar, presidential puppet, avaricious, criminal and surrounded by conflict of interest charges, active vote suppressor or “all of the above.” Postmaster General Louis DeJoy.

Let’s start with some very interesting facts that most of us are simply not aware of. You may or may not know that one of President Trump’s agendas is either to kill or privatize the United States Postal Service. Railing against what he claimed was effectively a federal subsidy, Trump also took aim specifically at Jeff Bezos, who owns the Trump-critical Washington Post, and deliveries from his main company, Amazon. There is so much wrong with the entire recent postal explosion. It stinks from the head. But the problems seem to be significantly and directly traceable to Mr. DeJoy.

From the September 14^th Forbes.com:  “Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s financial holdings in former employer XPO Logistics and other private sector firms are an ‘enormous’ financial conflict of interest that should result in his resignation or firing, experts testified to a House Oversight subcommittee Monday [9/14], as scrutiny has intensified into possible campaign finance violations before DeJoy arrived at the U.S. Postal Service and how his ties to the private sector and GOP might affect his work as postmaster general.

“DeJoy has at least $30 million invested in XPO Logistics, a USPS contractor that has been paid $14 million by the agency since DeJoy took office in June alone, and receives more than $2 million per year through warehouse and office space his LLCs lease to XPO, True North Research executive director Lisa Graves highlighted in her written opening statement to the House as a reason why DeJoy should ‘resign, or be fired.’

 

“Financial filings by DeJoy’s wife Aldona Wos also show that DeJoy has between $2 million and $11 million invested in private equity firm Warburg Pincus, which orchestrated the merger between XPO and DeJoy’s previous company, New Breed Logistics, and currently holds stakes in a number of logistics companies that Graves testified ‘could financially benefit from privatizing or parting out the U.S. Postal Service.’” Conflict that might rise to the level of a federal crime?

 

Hundreds of sorting machines and thousands of mailboxes have been removed by the USPS during DeJoy’s short tenure, and there have been significant delays in mail delivery all across the land. Seniors are not receiving their Medicare prescriptions or Social Security checks on time, shippers are finding spoilage in perishables, and there have been warnings from the USPS that people need to take extra time vis-à-vis vote-by-mail. Despite half-hearted responses to the contrary, DeJoy appears to be fulfilling the President’s belief that shutting off vote-by-mail possibilities will enhance his chances of reelection. In late August, when pressed by a Congressional committee, “Postmaster General Louis DeJoy told senators he had ‘no idea’ equipment was being removed until the public outcry, but has no plans to restore those mailboxes or sorting machines.” Christian Science Monitor, August 21^st. Few believe he did not know.

 

On September 17^th, a scathing opinion issued by a federal judge, in an action against DeJoy’s actions, may have begun the possibility of reversing some of the damage: “ A U.S. judge on Thursday [9/17]  blocked controversial Postal Service changes that have slowed mail nationwide, calling them 'a politically motivated attack on the efficiency of the Postal Service' before the November election… Judge Stanley Bastian in Yakima, Washington, said he was issuing a nationwide preliminary injunction sought by 14 states that sued the Trump administration and the U.S. Postal Service.

“The states challenged the Postal Service's so-called 'leave behind' policy, where trucks have been leaving postal facilities on time regardless of whether there is more mail to load. They also sought to force the Postal Service to treat election mail as first class mail.

“The judge noted after a hearing that Trump had repeatedly attacked voting by mail by making unfounded claims that it is rife with fraud. Many more voters are expected to vote by mail this November because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the states have expressed concern that delays might result in voters not receiving ballots or registration forms in time… 'The states have demonstrated the defendants are involved in a politically motivated attack on the efficiency of the Postal Service,' Bastian said.” CuzzBlue.com, September 18^th? But judge, DeJoy told us that all those moves were necessary to increase the efficiency of the USPS. We know that was false.

Writing for the September 18^th Los Angeles Times, Maya Lau and Laura J. Nelson, tell us the truth: “For new Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, who wanted the U.S. Postal Service to operate more efficiently, it seemed like an obvious fix: Just run the trucks on time… So in July he ordered drivers to start leaving post offices and distribution centers exactly on schedule and curtailed extra trips to pick up any mail that missed earlier cutoffs.

“The stricter deadlines sparked far less public outcry than the removal of more than 700 high-speed sorting machines at mail processing facilities around the country — but they were far more disruptive to the U.S. mail system, according to a Times investigation… Weeks-long delays began to ripple through a system already reeling from COVID-19 absences and a surge in package delivery during the pandemic, shaking Americans’ faith in one of the country’s most popular services and raising concerns about how the Postal Service will handle mail-in ballots in November.

“The abrupt scheduling move also raised more questions about DeJoy’s stewardship of the Postal Service, which has been marked by severe delivery snafus and charges by critics that he is working to slow service in order to help President Trump’s election bid by making voting by mail more difficult.

“Workers who spoke to The Times described troubling details about how the rigid schedules have played out: Some trucks have traveled empty, and mail left behind has accumulated at massive processing centers, creating backlogs in a system that is not designed to store mail. Loading dock managers have falsified records so it appears that trucks are departing earlier, some mail has been sorted twice, and in at least one case, a large shipment from Amazon was turned away because facilities had no space to process it.

“At a post office in Carmichael, Calif., near Sacramento, employees ran out of storage space and refused to accept about 1,500 packages from Amazon drivers Aug. 29, said Saintil Perry, president of the local chapter of the American Postal Workers Union… ‘That’s a no-no. That’s revenue, regardless of how heavy the shipment is,’ Perry said about refusing incoming parcels. ‘But they literally don’t have space. The letter carriers don’t have space. If they take on this mail, they won’t have time to leave because they would have to process it.’

“At a massive mail facility in Santa Ana, tractor-trailers began pulling away from the docks even if workers were in the middle of loading them, said Will Khong, president of the postal workers union’s Orange County-area chapter… That left-behind mail muddled one of the Postal Service’s key automated processes: sorting hundreds of thousands of letters into the exact order that they will be delivered along postal carriers’ routes. Workers had to sort some pieces of mail twice to ensure they were put in the proper order for the next day…

“At a sorting facility in Los Angeles, workers said that some days they missed getting mail onto trucks by a matter of minutes. Several times, they said, tractor-trailers pulled away while workers were headed toward the loading docks with cartons of sorted letters and parcels.

“Those changes, coupled with a cutback in overtime, left the facility swamped with backlogged packages for weeks. Steaks and fruit rotted inside their boxes and chicks were found dead in their packages, a Times investigation found. Conditions have gradually improved there, workers said… The effects of the change have rippled out to local post offices. Carriers across the state said they have seen outgoing mail — which is supposed to be sent for sorting the same day it is received — sitting in the post office the following morning.

“Leftover mail is disruptive to the system because postal facilities aren’t designed to store letters and packages, said Robert Fisher, a former Postal Service executive and owner of Fisher Postal Analytics, where he researches mail performance… Every day, managers specifically monitor how much mail is in a facility — known as on-hand volume — to make sure the levels do not get out of control, he said. ‘Leaving mail behind would increase on-hand volumes, disrupting the control processes and system balance,’ Fisher said.”

There’s an infection in the Trump administration: give a horrible a different name, call failure a success, deny the obvious and easily proven problems, and voila, you are done. Labels, name calling, vituperatives and denials trump obvious facts. Even if it is patently false, if you say it enough times, there is a substantial Trump constituency, bolstered by propaganda wings (like Fox News and Breitbart), that will buy it like the gospel. When the US mail is failing, as the President and his cronies hack away at the legs that hold it up, the symbolic loss of that institution that has been with us from the beginning of the republic should serve as a warning to us all. And no, Donald, it’s not a business any more than is the US Army; it’s a service for the American people.

            I’m Peter Dekom, and the systematic unraveling of long-standing federal institutions and ethical practices by the Trump administration will cost billions of dollars to fix and threaten the very existence of the nation itself.