Washington – The Board of Governors of the United States Postal Service is preparing for an acquisition attempt by the Trump administration and has retained an external lawyer to fight against any executive order for this purpose, according to two sources with knowledge of the Board plans.
The nine members of the Board, who are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, held an emergency meeting after the Senate confirmed Howard Lutnick on Wednesday for the Secretary of Commerce, the sources said. In December, Lutnick first discussed his plans with President Donald Trump to dissolve USPS leadership and fold the agency to the Department of Commerce, according to one of the sources.
There are no executive orders aimed at postal service, according to two White House officials, although they acknowledged that there have been conversations about ways to make it more efficient together with the rest of the federal government.
The Washington Post first reported a possible acquisition of USPS.
In the Oval office, during Lutnick’s sworn at Friday’s ceremony, Trump revealed that his new secretary of Commerce “will be looking” at USPS.
“You will see it, it has a great commercial instinct, which is what we need, and look at it. And we believe we can change it, but it is the postal service,” Trump said in response to the questions of the journalists. “We are losing A lot of money with the postal service, and we do not want to lose such money.
USPS reported a net gain of $ 144 million for the first quarter of this fiscal year, the first time the agency registered a profit since 2006, according to the PEW Research Center.
The postal Board believes that any executive order would be unconstitutional, since the postal service is authorized by the Constitution and was created by a Congress Law. It is also unlikely that Trump can privatize the agency without the approval of Congress.
Mark Dimondstein, president of the American Union of Postal Workers, said in a statement any acquisition attempt would be a “postal service attack.”
“The acquisition would reduce the service, especially to rural America, increase rates, closed postal offices and profits of what is owned by American people,” Dimondstein said. “We ask all our clients to join us in the fight to maintain our vibrant, independent and public postal service from the United States and to oppose these illegal acts.”
During his first administration, Trump Míd eliminated what is known as the obligation of the Universal Service, a federal requirement that orders the postal service to provide mail services to all US residents daily, regardless of where they live. If the Trump administration seeks to eliminate with USPS, it could affect millions of people to trust the postal service for critical email, including medicines, particularly in rural areas.
Usps discussions occur when the recently established government efficiency department, led by Technological billionaire Elon Musk, has reduced dozens of federal programs and has reduced thousands of government jobs during the first month of Trump’s second term. The cuts are part of a Trump and Musk effort to review the federal government.
Any effort to dismantle the postal service would not be an anomaly under the Trump administration, which has tried to double aspects of USAID and the Department of Education in other agencies. At the same time, many of Trump’s movements to implement rapid changes have found legal obstacles in court.
Republican Louis Dejy, head of the USPS during the last five years, announced plans to resign as the general director of Post Office this week. During the transition, Dejy met with members of the Trump’s incoming administration and did not go well, according to a source with knowledge of the meeting, who said that Dejy and Lutnick have also had a contentious relationship.
After 2020, when millions of Americans, mostly Democrats, voted by mail during the coronavirus pandemia, Trump’s relationship with Trump never defrost, according to a source familiar with the president’s thinking about the USPS and the vote by mail by mail . Trump criticized the practice in 2020 and blamed Joe Biden from his loss.
“Trump does not see the USPS as a service,” said the source, although the word is in its name. “It still has problems with vote by mail.”
