Nothing is quite so emblematic of the inherent contempt this administration holds towards our democracy than the fact that a federal judge had to order the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) to abide by its own “extraordinary measures” plan in order to timely deliver mail-in ballots in a national election.
A federal judge on Friday ordered the U.S. Postal Service to follow its own purported plan to get ballots delivered to election officials in time.
In a lengthy written order, U.S. District Judge Judge Emmet Sullivan laid out a series of instructions for the Postal Service aimed at areas of the country where completed ballots were taking too long to reach elections offices.
As reported by Matt Shuham writing for Talking Points Memo (TPM), this is the perfect illustration of how corruption in government—such as that evinced by the installation of Donald Trump backer and Republican Party fundraiser Louis DeJoy, who was placed in charge of the nation’s Postal Service in May of this year by Trump—can have far-reaching and drastic consequences. The “extraordinary measures” plan has existed since Oct. 20, first made public in a tweet by Democratic Congressman Jim Cooper. It provides detailed instructions to USPS managers and employees on measures to be taken to expedite the delivery of election ballots. But it was an advisory plan only. It required DeJoy to authorize it and make it happen. Instead, it appears he sat on it until the last possible moment, which of course seems to have been the intention all along.
The late action by the court is not the judge’s fault—the data on the USPS’ malfeasance and delay of service (or perhaps sheer incompetence—we won’t know which for a while) by necessity hadn’t come to light until—well, until it was too late to do much about it.
Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson sought a hearing in a separate Postal Service case after data showed “consistently poor Election Mail performance data in certain regions.”
Ferguson said data showed on-time delivery of ballots sent by voters in Michigan’s Detroit District dipped as low as 57%, while national processing has been 93% or higher.
As noted by a former member of the USPS governing board as quoted by The Washington Post, the slowdown in delivery to certain swing states is inexplicable.
“This is a disgrace,” said S. David Fineman, a former chair of the Postal Service’s governing board. “Here’s the bottom line: They knew that they had an obligation to deliver election mail on time. They’ve been told that both publicly in congressional hearings and four federal judges have told them that. One can’t understand how they could not have these facilities fully staffed so that election mail could be delivered on time. It’s beyond my belief that there’s a reason that something like this could happen.”
The judge’s order cites numerous areas around the country where the delivery of the mail is for some reason unusually slow right now.
Inbound Ballots: Alabama, Alaska, Appalachian, Atlanta, Central Pennsylvania, Colorado/Wyoming, Detroit, Ft. Worth, Greater Indiana, Greater Michigan, Greater S. Carolina, Greensboro, Gulf Atlantic, Kentuckiana, Lakeland, Louisiana, Mid-Carolinas, Mississippi, Northern New England, Oklahoma, Rio Grande, and Triboro.
As evidenced in Shuham’s report, Judge Sullivan is trying his level best to save our democracy from Donald Trump’s corruption and apparent connivance with DeJoy to suppress the 2020 vote.
It was just the latest example of Sullivan putting his foot down: On Wednesday, in yet another lawsuit against USPS, he ordered the Postal Service to make clear to employees that they should ignore since-blocked policies from Postmaster General Louis DeJoy that slowed mail delivery, such as eliminating late and extra trips.
Any doubts about the judge’s anger at this administration can be dispelled by reading the court order itself, which is fairly blistering, demanding the Postal Service explain the reasons for its delay of processing ballots—remarkably, in many of the same states where an anticipated surge in Democratic mail-in ballots are likely to thwart Trump’s chances of reelection.
As transcribed by Shuham for TPM:
ORDERED that beginning October 30, 2020, and until further order of the Court, Defendants shall file with the Court data by 10:00 AM each day (except for October 30, 2020, in which case it shall be filed at the earliest reasonably available time and, in any event, no later than 3:00 PM) data on the absolute number of Inbound Ballots and Outbound Ballots captured in the Election Mail processing scores data produced pursuant to this Court’s October 27, 2020 Minute Order. It is FURTHER ORDERED that beginning October 30, 2020, and until further order of the Court, Defendants shall provide to Plaintiffs by 11:00 AM each day native versions of the excel files of service performance data produced pursuant to this Court’s October 27, 2020 Minute Order. It is FURTHER ORDERED that at the conference before the Court at 5:00 PM on October 30, 2020, Defendants shall make a USPS representative with expertise in the data processing scores for Election Mail that USPS is producing, including expertise with respect to the data and issues identified in paragraphs 3 through 5 above, available to answer questions from the parties and the Court about the data. This representative shall also be available to describe and answer questions related to: (a) the methodology used to calculate processing scores for “Inbound Ballots,” “Outbound Ballots,” and “Outbound Non-Ballot Election Mail,” as those terms are used in Defendants’ submission; and (b) a detailed and specific explanation of those reasons, if any, why Defendants contend those processing scores are unreliable. Signed by Judge Emmet G. Sullivan on 10/30/2020. (lcegs3) (Entered: 10/30/2020)
The “conference” before the court referenced in the above order was set for 5 PM EST Friday, the same day the order was issued. So if it went forward, it’s probably going on right now, Friday evening, in the U.S. District Court of Washington, D.C.
This judge is pissed off. We’ll all find out fairly soon if it’s too late to make any difference.
Update: A video of the situation in Miami-Dade county posted by Kionne McGhee, the minority leader of the Florida statehouse, that has gone viral, depicting mail and ballots sitting, undelivered, for over a week.
“Extraordinary” times, indeed.