In one letter to Postmaster General David Steiner, the seven Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC) on Friday demanded that the United States Postal Service (USPS) stop implementing the new mail-in voting procedures required by President Donald Trump’s executive order. The senators also want answers on the legal authority of these new procedures no later than September 11, saying, “We reiterate our call to stop your breakneck implementation of the President’s unlawful executive order and to repeal the final rule on federal election mail.”
Trump issued Executive Order 14399“Ensuring Citizenship and Integrity Verification in Federal Elections,” March 31. The order directs the Department of Homeland Security, in coordination with the Social Security Administration, to compile state lists of individuals who have been verified as U.S. citizens, are at least 18 years old, and are residing in the state. It separately directs the USPS to establish requirements for envelopes, including agency approval and unique Intelligent Mail barcodes. USPS then released its final version Rule “Ballot slips for federal elections”.which took effect on August 21 and was published in the Federal Register on August 26.
A whistleblower disclosure received by HSGAC’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations alleged that the new systems risk “collapsing the mail-in voting system and disenfranchising millions of Americans” and described their development as a “seriously flawed, rushed and chaotic process” conducted without adequate testing or normal system standards. Especially the whistleblower allegedly that if a barcode in a batch of 10,000 ballots could not be scanned, the entire batch would be rejected and returned to the state. A USPS spokesperson told ProPublica that the agency is reviewing the whistleblower’s concerns and has spent months developing the system in accordance with court orders.
The letter sets a September 11 deadline for the USPS to provide legal authority for its new rule, describe its standards for its new ballot verification processes, and explain its efforts to comply with all current court orders and injunctions. HSGAC would also like to receive answers to any outstanding questions hearing on June 24: “Reforming the U.S. Postal Service’s Broken Business Model.”
On Thursday the administration filed an urgent application Ask the Supreme Court to suspend August 27th interim injunction issued by the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Attorney General D. John Sauer filed the motion on behalf of the USPS and the other federal parties.
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani replaced the preliminary injunction with a interim injunction This prohibits USPS from enforcing several provisions of the rule. The states subsequently challenged the rule informed the Supreme Court that the preliminary injunction and dissolution of the TRO rendered the administration’s motion moot.
Meanwhile, states are preparing to send mail-in ballots for the November election. North Carolina 100 county election boards were scheduled to begin mailing out ballots on Friday.
