Postmaster General confirms plan to hold back mail ballots in states that won't share voter data
thehill.com
Postmaster General David Steiner told lawmakers Wednesday that the U.S. Postal Service will no longer deliver mail-in ballots in states that refuse to provide sensitive voter data to the federal government, in line with a proposed rule from the Trump administration. Steiner defended the measure at a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing, saying it was to ensure that “the right ballots are going to the right people” after Senate Democrats aired concerns about the proposal.

“If a state refuses to turn their absentee voter list over to the federal government, will the Postal Service still mail their ballots under this proposal rule?” Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), the committee’s top Democrat, asked Steiner.

“Under our proposed regulation, no,” Steiner replied.

  • ryper@lemmy.caEnglish
    13·
    4 hours ago

    Earlier this year the Supreme Court just happened to rule that USPS can’t be sued for not delivering mail.

    A divided Supreme Court sided with the federal government on Tuesday in U.S. Postal Service v. Konan, a dispute over mishandled mail. Writing for a 5-4 majority, Justice Clarence Thomas explained that a law protecting the U.S. Postal Service from lawsuits over lost or miscarried mail bars lawsuits over mail that was intentionally misdelivered.

    On Tuesday, the court sided with the government, holding that an intentional failure to deliver the mail falls within the FTCA’s postal exception. The ordinary meanings of both “miscarriage” and “loss” point the court to this conclusion, wrote Thomas in the majority opinion. “Because a ‘miscarriage’ includes any failure of mail to arrive properly, a person experiences a miscarriage of mail when his mail is delivered to his neighbor, held at the post office, or returned to the sender—regardless of why it happened,” he wrote. Similarly, “[w]hen Congress enacted the FTCA, the ‘loss’ of mail ordinarily meant a deprivation of mail, regardless of how the deprivation was brought about.”