Mitchell Votes No on Overstated Usps Emergency Bill

Statement

WASHINGTON -- Congressman Paul Mitchell (MI-10) released the following statement after voting no on H.R. 8015, the House Democrat's Postal Service bill:

"It is disappointing that rather than coming back into session to work on much needed COVID-19 relief, Speaker Pelosi called an "emergency' session for a supposed crisis at the United States Postal Service.

There is no merit to claims the USPS will be insolvent before the election. The agency has stated it is ready to meet all delivery requirements and use its existing resources to handle any unforeseen demand, and Postmaster General Louis DeJoy testified before Congress affirming the agency is fully capable of handling election mail.

The USPS has had financial issues for many years and desperately needs to make structural changes to remain solvent and self-sufficient in the long-term. USPS leadership has long stated this, across Postmasters and administrations, and recently adjusted some of their operating practices to help remedy its fiscal challenges. These adjustments were long-proposed and were intended to address longstanding inefficiencies, mail volume changes, and high costs, but to avoid the possibility of any impact on 2020 election mail or the appearance of ill intent, USPS announced these changes will be paused until after the election.

Unfortunately, H.R. 8015 ignores all of these facts and handicaps an already struggling institution by taking unprecedented steps to hamstring USPS leadership from making any necessary reforms to address its long-standing structural problems and from trying to improve their efficiency. H.R. 8015 puts an additional $25 billion of taxpayers' money into a system that is supposed to be self-sufficient, even though USPS has already stated they will be solvent and operational until at least August 2021 and the CARES Act provided an additional $10 billion in Treasury lending authority the USPS has yet to tap into.

The facts are clear -- there is no "emergency' at the United States Postal Service, yet Democrats have chosen to spread misinformation on the state of the USPS for political gain. Once again, I implore House Democrats to get serious about working for the American people rather than fabricating a crisis for an election year talking point."

Source