USPS Fights State Demands for Evidence on Mailboxes, Machines
USPS Fights State Demands for Evidence on Mailboxes, Machines
(Bloomberg) -- The Trump administration is pushing back on demands for evidence sought by 14 states that sued over operational changes at the U.S. Postal Service they say could hobble mail-in balloting ahead of November’s election.
The U.S. said in a filing late Tuesday that providing the states with some evidence sought in the case “may be burdensome without an obvious benefit, such as providing the location of specific mailboxes that are to be removed, if any.” Other demands for evidence are “overly broad,” such as a list of all mail-sorting machines that were identified for removal after May, when DeJoy was selected for his job, the government said.
The states, led by Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson, sued President Donald Trump, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and the USPS last week. They argue that expedited evidence production is required because any court-ordered relief “must be obtained quickly” to be effective. The U.S. says DeJoy, who committed to halting additional changes at the USPS until after the election, has already given much of the information directly in sworn testimony to Congress since the suit was filed on Aug. 18.
The USPS said in the filing that it plans to further challenge discovery on the grounds that the states don’t have standing to sue the federal government on behalf of citizens in such a case, and “because any future injuries to them with respect to the November election are too speculative.”
Two other groups of states have filed similar suits against the USPS and DeJoy in federal courts in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. The suits track claims made by Democratic lawmakers that DeJoy, a longtime Republican donor, made destructive changes at the post office months before an expected wave of mail-in ballots during the pandemic. Several state attorneys general say the changes are intended to help Trump win.
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