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Postal Service chief says work stopped on computer system key to Trump effort to limit mail voting
WASHINGTON (AP) — The top official at the U.S. Postal Service said Thursday that the agency has stopped work on developing a controversial computer system that was central to President Donald Trump’s effort to limit mail voting after the Supreme Court rejected his executive order this week. “There’s an injunction so we’re not doing anything,” postmaster general David Steiner told The Associated Press in an interview. Steiner, a onetime chief executive of Waste Management, has spent most of the past year atop the postal service navigating political and financial challenges. He’s pressing Congress for changes that would help him resolve what he has called a “liquidity crisis.” And Trump’s efforts to largely eradicate mail voting turned the postal service into an unlikely arbiter of who is eligible to vote just months before this year’s critical midterm elections, a role Steiner seemingly had little interest in playing. Unlike Trump, who was sharply critical of the Supreme Court decision and ridiculed some of the justices, Steiner offered no assessment of the court’s action. Steiner also declined to take a position on Trump’s policy, presenting himself as the leader of an “independent agency of the executive branch” whose influence over the president’s order was limited to operational concerns. “I don’t get to decide what rules that are put on us that I decide to accept or not accept,” he said. “I looked at it more from the execution side.” The postal service has asserted its independence in the past, including during a 2019 standoff when the first Trump administration sought to pressure the agency as the president was in a dispute with Amazon. Steiner said he wouldn’t get into the “nuance” of that. But the pressure has grown so intense at points that it’s fueled talk of whether Steiner might resign, a notion he denied. “There’s no truth to that,” he said. “I think I know the motivation behind it. I think it’s somebody that would like to see me out of a job.” Sign up for the Ground Game Newsletter: Your guide to the biggest stories in politics, policy and U.S. elections. Inserting the Postal Service into elections The executive order Trump signed in March directed several federal agencies to develop state citizenship lists. Those lists would have been delivered to an online portal at the Postal Service, which would have been allowed to send mail ballots only to voters who were cleared through the process. Steiner said he knew about the order about a month before it was unveiled but said his focus was largely on implementation, not the policy’s merits. A whistleblower report released earlier this month by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., argued the system was hastily built and riddled with errors. Steiner said he read “portions” of the whistleblower report and acknowledged the obstacles associated with building such a massive platform quickly. Still, he said he had confidence in colleagues working on the project and had planned to unveil it around Sept. 15. “There’s absolutely no doubt that we worked fast,” he said. “My personal opinion is it was a monumental task and I’m very proud of our IT department for being able to do it that fast.” In addition to the voter list, Trump’s order would have required states to adopt a uniform envelope style that included barcodes, something states said would have been arduous so close to the election. Following the Supreme Court’s ruling, a memo sent to all postal service employees Wednesday and obtained by the AP said the agency will “not be enforcing any of these new rules in the 2026 federal election.” “First and foremost, for Election Mail it is business as usual,” according to the memo. “We continue to follow established protocols, and we remain entirely focused on our core mission: delivering the mail safely and securely for voters and election officials across the country.” Though the Supreme Court rejected Trump’s executive order for this year’s election, Justice Brett Kavanaugh indicated he might rule in favor of the administration if the issue comes back before the court at a later time. Steiner encourages voters to cast ballots early Steiner said the postal service would still encourage the use of envelopes and barcodes in future elections, which it has long recommended. He said such changes wouldn’t be required but those who don’t comply may have to pay more. “If you use the barcode in the envelope, we’ll charge you a lower price,” he said. “If you don’t, we’re going to charge you a higher price because it’s harder for us to process.” While the postal service isn’t moving forward on Trump’s order, there are still concerns about postmark delays that could have an impact on this year’s elections. The number of ballots rejected for late postmarks has soared in the vote-by-mail states of Washington and Oregon, according to recently released data highlighting concerns about recent changes in postal service operations. Steiner said there were no plans to alter those operations and encouraged voters who use mail to get their ballots in early. “We say seven days,” he said. “Everything is solved if people vote early.”
