08/13/2020

Trump's Opposing Funding for U.S. Postal Service

He believes that the funding will allow for more mail-in ballot voting

Earlier today, President Donald Trump said that he will not support emergency funding the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) because it would help expand mail-in voting during the pandemic. Trump told reporters he would not approve the $25 billion in USPS funding that congressional Democrats seek, or $3.5 billion in supplemental funding for the revenue-challenged agency.

“Now, they need that money in order to make the post office work, so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots,” Trump said in a Fox News interview. “Now, if we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting. They just can’t have it.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said $25 billion is the amount that the USPS said it needs to continue to operate and deliver critical services to Americans during the pandemic.

“In earlier COVID bills, the president has stood in the way of any money for the Postal Service,” Pelosi said on Morning Joe. “If the president read the Constitution, he would see that the postal service is memorialized there and Congress has a role in all of this.”

Pelosi said the postal service delivers more than 1.2 billion prescription medications sent through the mail to senior citizens and veterans.

“So, they’re hurting seniors,” Pelosi said of Trump’s refusal to provide assistance to the agency. “It’s a health issue, even more so in the time of the pandemic.”

This article was provided to OSAE by the Power of A and ASAE's Inroads.