Trump megadonor and political lackey, Louis DeJoy, has been dismantling the United States Postal Service ever since he took over as Postmaster General in June. His decisions have clearly been made to slow the mail processing, reduce efficiency and lead to widespread questions about mail in ballots. In addition to cutting back hours and eliminating overtime, he has begun removing sorting machines that expedite mail processing. DeJoy has even ordered the removal of tons of post office boxes nationwide. DeJoy conducted his own Friday night massacre where he fired numerous high level staff at USPS. The Postal Carriers Union sees what Trump and DeJoy are doing and actually endorsed Joe Biden on Friday. And there were even protests in front of DeJoy's DC condo on Saturday.
The Democrats finally did something - they have set up a hearing in the House Oversight Committee on August 24th. I am 99% sure that DeJoy will find a reason to delay or skip the hearing, but who knows. Tiffany Cross broke the news about the hearing on MSNBC and had an interview with Rep. Tlaib, a member of the House Oversight Committee.
TLAID: I can tell you especially in my district folks can see that the President is trying to defund the Postal Service and dismantle it so he can be able to hijack this election in coming November, but also the fact that there has always been an attempt to privatize our postal service, it's been there, many folks he has appointed to his administration have actually written papers how to dismantle and take over the postal service, just like they did to our educational system, the correction system, so many areas of our government has been privatized and made into for-profit schemes and he's trying to do it here in the middle of a critical election. Yes, as early as August 24th our House Oversight Committee under the leadership of Chairwoman Maloney is going to hold a hearing, a very critical hearing. You know, folks and the American people need to know House Oversight Committee we are the watchdogs, we have to oversee especially illegal activity, especially things we feel like are very much circumventing our political process, our democracy and in this case it is the President of the United States trying to defund our U.S. Postal Service for his own self-interest.
CROSS: I think a lot of people, you know, I think sometimes on the Sunday shows it's very Beltway-centric and it's, you know, very political people talking to and for each other but for many people they don't know the function of the Oversight Committee and the House is up for grabs, too. I tell people '"Imagine if Republicans controlled the House," the Oversight Committee has been a crucial point in the balance of government. I appreciate you pointing that out and you are definitely a crucial member on that Committee. Something that people don't understand about the postal service it costs zero dollars in taxpayer money. Zero. Zero. And I think that's a misconception that folks have. What is it that you want to hear specifically from DeJoy?
TLAIB: I think we really want to be able to understand what are these decisions being made because right here in Michigan in one of our central stations they took the sorting machines out.
CROSS: That's right.
TLAIB: I will ask my colleagues, I think we should start showing up to these postal service places and actually go in and see exactly what's happening because these are being done behind closed doors in hopes that the American people doesn't see and that's the Oversight Committee has to do is open up the curtain and see who is behind it and what the true intentions are because it's not to make sure that folks have access to voting. It's not to make sure that people have access to their medication and everything that is involved because, yes, this is about our democracy but so many of the most vulnerable in our community rely on the postal service. This is an agency that people don't understand, yes, it's not a pharmacy, but sure enough a lot of folks get their insulin through the mail, their medication, a lot of people don't understand they get their documents for unemployment, their stimulus payments, many of which still have not gotten their stimulus payments. I get calls every single day that Mnuchin and the IRS and folks in the Trump administration have still held up many of the folks that really rely and have been living check by check are still waiting for their relief payment. So it is so critical that we understand the Postal Service is important to the quality of life of our neighbors across this nation and we have to hold this administration accountable and we can't allow him to hijack and dismantle and defund the Postal Service.
CROSS: That's right and you bring up insulin insulin. My mother gets so annoyed when I talk about her on the air but she gets her insulin from the Postal Service. It's true, the Postal Service is a crucial part of our lives, PPE comes through the Postal Service and they employ over 600,000 people, a lot of black and brown people as well.
I still highly doubt DeJoy will show, but who knows. Maybe he will come and just lie his face off and smirk and treat this hearing as a joke. It would be totally on brand for anyone closely aligned with Donald Trump.
