Ian Patrick, FISM News
The United States Postal Service is taking the 2020 election chaos to heart by creating a brand new division that will specifically oversee mail-in ballots during election seasons.
The division, known as the Election and Government Mail Services, is intended to solely focus on election-related mailings and problems instead of the whole department dealing with issues as they crop up. Adrienne Marshall, the executive director of the new division, displayed confidence in the new department.
“We are fully committed to the secure and timely delivery of the nation’s election mail,” she told news outlets. Specifically, the division will oversee “election mail strike teams” in local communities to handle election problems right away.
Election officials nationwide should be receiving guidance letters from USPS sometime this week.
Leading up to and after the 2020 election, the USPS faced backlogs of mail-in ballots and even warned that some of these ballots would be counted late. The resulting turmoil garnered reactions from both sides of the political spectrum, as some offered reform in the shape of legislation while others took legal action.
Still, the Postal Service claims that it delivered 97.9% of ballots to election officials within three days. Within seven days, the USPS says it delivered 99.89% of ballots to officials.
The Postal Service has already had to put its election mail services to good use this year, with 40 million ballots mailed to and from voters for primary elections.
The announcement of this division follows the Biden administration’s budget proposal for 2023, which included “an expansion of USPS delivery capacity in underserved areas and support for vote-by-mail, including making ballots postage free and reducing the cost of other election-related mail for jurisdictions and voters.”
The 2023 budget proposal called for “$10 billion in new elections assistance funding to be allocated over 10 years.”
It also follows a general increase in the pricing on mailing services, including Forever Stamps.