Washington state postal workers defied USPS orders and reinstalled mail sorting machines. According to Forbes, two facilities, one in Seattle-Tacoma and one in Dallas, appear to be ignoring directives from Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and Postal Service’s head of maintenance, Kevin Couch, to not use decommissioned sorting machines. The machines were disconnected and moved on orders from DeJoy earlier this month, and he has been taking a lot of heat for the decision.
Forbes notes that, in the Seattle-Tacoma area, about 40 percent of the high-speed mail sorting machines were disconnected or dismantled, due to DeJoy’s orders. USPS workers in the Tacoma, Washington sorting plant told reporters that they have 18 machines for sorting and postmarking letters. Eight of those machines were reported to have been pushed into a corner after being disconnected. Additionally, a sorting machine in Wenatchee, Washington was also reportedly reconnected, against Couch’s orders. This news comes after DeJoy testified before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Friday, and answered questions about why he’d been having sorting machines disconnected.
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Trump admitted he’s refusing to fund the USPS because he doesn’t want mail voting to be expanded.
Postmaster DeJoy, who gave over $1 million to Trump’s campaign, has removed over 600 machines workers say they need to handle election mail. Today, he confirmed their removal. pic.twitter.com/HlgfdXG1o6
— Mother Jones (@MotherJones) August 24, 2020
Coincidentally, DeJoy’s controversial USPS directives were revealed following an interview President Donald Trump gave, wherein he revealed that he is not agreeing to a stimulus package deal with Democrats due to their push for USPS and mail-in ballot funding. “It’s their fault. They want $3.5 billion for something that’s fraudulent. For the mail-in votes, universal mail-in ballots,” Trump said during an appearance on Fox Business Network’s Mornings with Maria.
He went on to say, “They want $25 billion for the post office. They need that money so it can work and they can take these millions and millions of ballots. […] But if they don’t get those two items, then they can’t have mail-in ballots.” Trump then said. “If we don’t make a deal, that means they won’t get the money and they won’t have universal mail-in voting.” While he has long been opposed to the use of mail-in ballots, due to his belief that they can be easily falsified or fabricated, Trump has voted by mail on more then one occasion. He and First Lady Melania even recently voted by mail in the Florida primaries this year.
