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Speaker Nancy Pelosi is calling the House back at the start of her summer recess in an effort to shield the U.S. Postal Service from efforts to block funding and suppress postal voting in the November election.
Pelosi said the House would return later this week to vote on a bill prohibiting the USPS from changing its operations or service levels from what it had in place at the start of 2020. Previously, the House had not been scheduled to vote until September 15.
She said Sunday night that Donald Trump was attempting to sabotage the election by manipulating the postal service, and called Postmaster Louis DeJoy a “accomplice pal” by making changes that degrade service and delay mail.
“The life, livelihood and the life of our American democracy are threatened by the president,” she said, calling for a day of action on Tuesday. “In a time of pandemic, the postal service is at the heart of elections. Americans shouldn’t have to choose between their health and their vote. “
His comments echo those of Bernie Sanders, who told NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday that Trump’s attacks on mail-in voting and his administration’s efforts to block funds for the U.S. Post were “a crisis for the American democracy ”before the presidential election in November. election.
“What you are witnessing is a President of the United States doing all he can to suppress the vote, make it harder for people to participate in postal voting at a time when people are putting their lives on the line. at stake by having to go to a polling station and vote, ”he said.
An unprecedented number of Americans are expected to vote by mail this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In recent months, states in the United States have seen a record number of Americans requesting ballots and submitting votes by mail in primary and other elections.
However, there are concerns whether the USPS, which is already facing a serious financial crisis, will be able to send the ballots to voters and return them to polling stations in time to be counted.
Congressional Democrats announced on Sunday that DeJoy and Robert Duncan, chairman of the Postal Service board of governors, had been invited to an Aug. 24 hearing by the House Oversight Committee. The hearing will examine the recent withdrawal of letterboxes and the shutdown of sorting machines across the country.
DeJoy has firmly denied any political interference, and Trump told a press briefing on Saturday that DeJoy was, in fact, trying to “make the post office great again.”
But last week Trump openly admitted he was blocking $ 25 billion in proposed aid to the post office because he wanted to make postal voting more difficult.
Reuters contributed to this report
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