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By Rachel Dobkin
Weekend Reporter
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A coalition of state and local election officials warned in a letter on Wednesday that issues within the United States Postal Service (USPS) may disrupt voting in November's election.
In the letter to U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, two groups that represent top election administrators in all 50 states—the National Association of Secretaries of State and the National Association of State Election Directors—detailed shortcomings of the mail service over the past year. The letter was released on the day that the first mailed ballots of the 2024 general election went out to absentee voters in Alabama.
One warning in the letter was that mailed ballots that were postmarked on time were received by local election officials days after the deadline to be counted. According to the letter, local election offices "in nearly every state" are receiving ballots postmarked on time after Election Day and outside of the three to five business days USPS claims as the standard for first-class mail.
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Meanwhile, some properly addressed ballots were being returned to election offices as undeliverable, which could trigger a voter to be moved to "inactive" status under federal law for maintaining an accurate list of registered voters, according to the election workers. This could require Americans to take additional action to verify their address to vote in the upcoming election, the letter warns.
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The election officials said in the letter that repeated outreach to USPS to resolve these widespread issues had failed, writing, "We have not seen improvement or concerted efforts to remediate our concerns."
These issues are "not one-off mistakes or a problem with specific facilities. Instead, it demonstrates a pervasive lack of understanding and enforcement of USPS policies among its employees," the letter read.
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"We implore you to take immediate and tangible corrective action to address the ongoing performance issues with USPS election mail service," the election officials told DeJoy. "Failure to do so will risk limiting voter participation and trust in the election process."
These issues come at a time of distrust in elections among former President Donald Trump's base. Trump, the 2024 GOP presidential nominee, sowed doubts about mail-in ballots ahead of the 2020 election, which he lost to President Joe Biden. He then repeatedly claimed, without substantial evidence, that the election was stolen from him via widespread voter fraud.
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Trump and his supporters have continued to claim the 2020 election was rigged and during the first presidential debate with Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris in Philadelphia Tuesday night, Trump refused to acknowledge that he lost the 2020 election.
Meanwhile, this time around, both Democrats and Republicans, including Trump, have encouraged supporters to vote early, either in person or by mail.
Wednesday's letter, which was also supported by leaders of groups that represent local election officials in 25 states, comes less than two weeks after DeJoy said in an interview that USPS is ready for the influx of mail-in ballots they are about to receive and is better positioned to handle it than it was during the 2020 election.
"We're going to be in great shape for the election. I'm pretty confident about everything that were doing," DeJoy told The Associated Press (AP) on August 29. "The American people should be confident."
On Wednesday, USPS reiterated DeJoy's assurances and said mail is currently being delivered in 2.7 days on average. However, Postal Service officials urged voters not to procrastinate when returning their ballots.
"We are ready to deliver. We were successful in 2020 delivering a historic volume of mail in ballots; also in 2022 and will do so again in November 2024," Adrienne Marshall, director of Election Mail and Government Services, said in a statement.
This article includes reporting from The Associated Press.
Update 9/12/24 10:40 a.m. ET: This article has been updated with additional information.
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