WASHINGTON—The Letter Carriers and their senatorial allies launched a campaign for legislation to permanently halt President Donald Trump’s attempts to disrupt mail-in voting.
The Absentee Mail Voter Protection Act, introduced May 22 by Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., the top Democrat on the Senate panel that writes postal legislation, would overturn Trump’s March 31 executive order mandating the Postal Service become involved in determining which mail-in ballots are legitimate.
The Constitution says, deliberately, that states run elections, without manipulation by the president or interference by USPS. The union and the senators want to keep it that way. Trump doesn’t.
The measure, co-sponsored by Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., and Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., would also ban such executive orders in the future. And the union convinced the three lawmakers to get 34 Democratic senators, including themselves, to sign a letter urging the USPS board to reject any and all mail-in voting bans.
“NALC appreciates Sens. Peters, Padilla, and Durbin’s leadership in fighting to protect Americans’ access to mail-in ballots,” union President Brian Renfroe said. “Voting by mail is safe, secure, and makes it easier for tens of millions of Americans to participate in our democracy. As this executive order is considered in the courts, NALC supports this legislation that focuses on protecting Americans’ right to vote by mail.”
Trump has long tried to end mail-in balloting even though, ironically, he uses it himself when voting from the White House in Florida elections. One of his conspiracy theory lies revolves around mail-in ballots. He lies by calling mail-in ballots a route to vote fraud, especially in cities with majorities of people of color.
He also says the late counts on election nights of mailed-in ballots make those numbers dubious. Trump bases his claim on the 2020 presidential election outcome, when mail-in ballots, which were counted last, first in Arizona and then in Philadelphia, swung Arizona and Pennsylvania away from his column and into Democrat Joe Biden’s tally. Trump fumed about mail-in ballots ever since.
Trump’s order lets USPS reject and refuse delivery of ballots unless states comply with newly established federal eligibility lists, a Letter Carriers fact sheet says. And it says Trump’s Department of Homeland Security, which is demanding voter registration lists from the states—and meeting a lot of resistance—gets to furnish the lists of voting-age people, after combing through them.
The AMVP bill also “bans any similar executive orders by blocking” the Justice and Homeland Security Departments “from sharing state voter lists,” the union’s analysis says. And it defunds “DOJ’s efforts to compel production of state voter lists,” while “enforcing the Privacy Act by barring federal agencies from improperly sharing voter data, both within the government and with outside groups, and defunding future Commerce Department efforts to enact partisan regulation of mail-in ballots.”
Anticipating Trump’s vengeful executive order against mail-in ballots, the normally mild-mannered Peters, who is retiring at the end of this Congress, gave a strong speech beforehand defending both the Postal Service and its nonpartisan handling of ballots, as well as the whole idea of mail-in voting.
Most states and Washington, D.C., provide for mail-in voting. Washington, Oregon, Utah, Colorado, and four others have totally switched to it. Alaska, given its geography and the fact that many of its far-flung communities can be reached only by small planes or boats, totally depends on it, too.
“The Postal Service doesn’t care which politicians you may support. Its only priority is to deliver the mail to every community in the country. The president is now trying to corrupt this mission,” Peters said before Trump unveiled his order.
“If the president is successful in forcing the Postal Service to play a role in running elections, he will completely erode the trust of this storied institution.”
“Millions of Americans, including President Trump, use this method to exercise their right to vote. American elections have a long history of being free, fair, and secure, and vote-by-mail is a key part of ensuring more Americans can participate in our democracy.”
As the top Democrat on the usually low-key and non-ideological committee, Peters can bring up his mail-in balloting bill at almost any time. So can Durbin, as the Democratic whip.
Durbin, who is also retiring, declared, “The right to vote is fundamental to our nation’s democracy. But the president, time and time again, has attacked Americans’ access to the ballot box, and his latest strategy is an executive order that targets mail-in voting.”
Added Padilla: “In a country founded on the ideals of ‘We the People,’ in which the right to vote is fundamental to who we are as a nation, people shouldn’t have to work too hard to have their voices heard and their votes counted.” He called Trump’s order “an illegal power grab.”
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