L.I. officials urge funding, protection for U.S. Postal Service

Local elected and mail carrier officials gathered at the Freeport Post Office today to demand full funding and protection of the United States Postal Service as President Donald Trump continues to propose the privatization of the USPS. 

U.S. Rep. Kathleen Rice led the news conference as she backed proposed legislation sponsored by fellow Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, the Delivering for America Act, to provide $25 billion of funding to USPS, as well as repealing the changes brought forth by Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and resetting the USPS to how it operated before the pandemic. 

Peter Furgiuel, president of the Long Island Postal Workers Union, said that even before DeJoy had taken office on June 13, post offices across the country were having mail sorting and distribution machines removed. Workers were also no longer allowed to work overtime. 

Furgiuel said the changes enacted by DeJoy have severely impacted the reliability of the USPS. 

“It used to be that when you sent something out on Tuesday, 98 percent of the time, it would get where it needed to go by Wednesday,” Furgiuel said. “Now we ran one of our tests, and the letter I mailed to myself from Rocky Point on Friday didn’t get to my home at Babylon until Thursday. It took six whole days, and that shouldn’t be the case.” 

Walter Barton, president of the National Association of Letter Carriers 6,000, which has about 3,600 local members, echoed Furgiuel’s worries. He said the postal service was the largest employer of veterans, and that seniors depend on the service for their medication and pension checks. 

Barton criticized DeJoy and Trump’s actions against the USPS, and said he was troubled by any attempt to undermine a service that had gone above and beyond for all residents during the pandemic. He added that during the pandemic, 82 postal workers had gotten Covid-19, with one employee dying from it. 

“We’ve worked everyday to deliver checks, medicine and important documents for the American people.” Barton said. “It’s important that the USPS get the funding it deserves, not get privatized.”       

Scottie Coads, state civic engagement chair of the NAACP, found the idea of privatizing the USPS concerning. Coads feared that the privatization of the USPS would lead to voter suppression among communities of color, who would depend on voting through the mail this election year amid the pandemic. 

Rice called the actions against the post office “cowardly,” and fueled by nothing more than a desire to limit voting as most voters would chose to vote through the mail rather than at polling places. 

“By slowing down the mail, [Trump] is saying that he wants everyone who is susceptible and vulnerable to Covid-19, our elderly, to get out into crowded spaces to vote,” Rice said. It’s outrageous and un-American to demand that of people during a pandemic.”  

Congress will reconvene for the next two weeks to hear testimony from DeJoy, as well as vote on the proposed legislation to fund the USPS and remove all the changes DeJoy put in place.