One week from Election Day, DC District Court Judge Emmett Sullivan told the Postal Service that her staff would be allowed for late and additional delivery trips and that it was important to cast ballots by the state deadline. Sullivan’s order largely follows a proposed plan agreed upon by the plaintiffs against USBS and the Postal Service, which includes the NAACP and the Vote Forward Committee.
States and other groups sought to have the courts monitor and enforce their judgments. Sullivan’s order on Tuesday stops the judge from monitoring USPS operations on a daily basis, leading to the election.
According to the judge’s order, the postal service will now have to tell many of its employees to “make the necessary delays and make extra trips, especially for election mail, to increase mail deliveries on time.”
“To be clear, delayed and additional trips must be made on the same or higher scale than those performed before July 2020. Doing so will increase mail deliveries in a timely manner. Any prior communications that do not comply with this instruction should be ignored,” the order continued.
The Postal Service has refused to issue any other order except to say that the issuance of ballots is its priority.
Last week, prosecuting groups in Washington, D.C., accused the Postal Service of failing to comply with court orders and delaying additional mail delivery trips – allowing mail to be delivered quickly – even reduced since July. , When the postal service initially tried to encourage those trips.
NAACP’s attorneys told the judge last week that “the defendants’ leg drag and failure to clearly change the July 2020 policy changes made it impossible for them to reasonably complain about the difficulty in proving their compliance.” “There are less than two weeks until election day. Until then, every day, hundreds of thousands of voters will seek to return their ballots. There is an urgent need to take immediate action.”
The Postal Service maintained in court that it had made it clear to staff that late and extra delivery trips were not prohibited. “The defendants have undeniably complied with the orders of this court and they are acting very aggressively,” the attorneys for the judiciary representing the USPS told the judge.
According to Sullivan’s order on Tuesday, the postal service must now provide the court with daily updates on mail delivery data, and the administration’s attorneys appeared before the judge daily.
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