DeJoy proposal renews Pascrell’s calls for postmaster’s ouster

Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-Paterson) delivered a withering criticism of a new strategic plan announced by Postmaster General Louis DeJoy that would cut Postal Service hours and slow mail delivery while raising postage rates.

“This so-called plan offered by USPS leadership should itself be a dead letter,” Pascrell said. “Americans demand the restoration of the reliable postal service they have always known and are entitled to as citizens of this country. Today’s announcement is a blueprint for the Post Office’s continued decay and destruction.”

DeJoy’s proposal would extend delivery windows for first-class packages by a day, broadening delivery standards the agency has often failed to meet under his tenure. It would also see the return of early post office closures that caused a public outcry and accusations of attempted electoral interference this summer.

The change in postal rates is perhaps the least controversial measure. That policy could help the Postal Service claw its way out from under $188 billion in liabilities.

But the postmaster’s plan isn’t winning him any praise from Democrats already aggravated over what they see as an attempt to hamper widespread mail-in voting last year.

“It is yet one more demonstration of why the whole leadership over there needs to be removed,” Pascrell said. “The entire sitting Postal Board of Governors should be fired immediately for their silence and complicity in USPS’s decimation, and then Mr. DeJoy should be should be escorted to the street where his bags are waiting for him. Every day we wait to clean house further endangers the American Post Office.”