The Postal Service could be dead in three months

Dear MoveOn member,

The U.S. Postal Service could be dead in three months unless Congress provides emergency funding to shore up this crucial public service.¹

But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, and the Republicans are refusing to include the Postal Service in any coronavirus relief legislation, because privatizing mail delivery has been a long-term goal of the conservative movement, and they see this crisis as their opportunity to kill off the Postal Service once and for all.²

Meanwhile, Donald Trump hates the Postal Service for his own sociopathic reason: The Postal Service delivers packages for Amazon, whose founder, Jeff Bezos, also owns The Washington Post, a newspaper that hasn't been afraid to publish hard-hitting journalism on the Trump administration.³ So, in the middle of a global pandemic and the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, Trump is threatening to bankrupt a critically important public service to exact revenge for his petty grievances.⁴

Democrats are pushing hard to get emergency funding for the Postal Service included in the next coronavirus relief bill, and MoveOn is launching a digital ad campaign to demand that Trump and the Republicans stop blocking Postal Service relief funding. To make sure they can't ignore us, we will run targeted ads in rural districts that would be hit hardest by the Postal Service shutdown—communities that Trump must win big to have any chance of re-election.

Can you chip in $5 a month to help launch and sustain a digital ad campaign calling on Congress to include desperately needed aid to the United States Postal Service in the next stimulus package and to continue to fight to save the Post Office all the way until Election Day?

The death of the Postal Service would be a crushing blow to Americans desperately trying to get by while sheltering in place.

Rural communities might never bounce back without the guarantee of reliable, standard-rate mail service. Small businesses in rural communities that rely on mail-order customers would go bankrupt. And people who live in these communities would be unable to get the essential deliveries—including medicine—they count on the Postal Service to deliver.⁵

The death of the Postal Service would also eliminate any kind of vote-by-mail program, disenfranchising millions of voters in November. And postal workers—39% of whom are people of color—would be left jobless.⁶

Most Americans don't know it, but the Postal Service doesn't receive a single taxpayer dollar.⁷ It is entirely funded by revenue from the sales of stamps and postage. But just like so many other businesses, the Postal Service has seen its revenue collapse during this pandemic. As a result, the entire operation could go bust by September, according to the postmaster general and the postal workers union.

It's especially tragic considering that postal workers, like doctors, nurses, and other essential workers, are getting sick and dying while working on the front lines of this pandemic to keep the rest of us afloat.⁸

Just imagine what life would be like right now if the mail stopped coming or if the only way to send or receive mail was to pay FedEx rates. It would be devastating. But Trump can't get over the fact that The Washington Post doesn't give him nonstop positive coverage. And privatization of mail delivery would be a massive boon to his corporate donors—at the expense of everyday Americans.

The next coronavirus relief bill could get passed as early as this week, and funding for the Postal Service must be included in it. With your help, we will launch a digital ad campaign calling out Trump and McConnell for blocking this desperately needed funding.

Can you chip in $5 a month to help launch and sustain a digital ad campaign, and keep it running for as long as it takes to stop Donald Trump from shutting down the United States Postal Service? 

Thanks for all you do.

–Kelly, Seth, Jenn, Lisa, and the rest of the team

Sources:

1. "The Head of the Postal Workers Union Says the Postal Service Could Be Dead in Three Months," In These Times, April 16, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/119675?t=6&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

2. "White House rejects bailout for U.S. Postal Service battered by coronavirus," The Washington Post, April 11, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/119602?t=8&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

3. "Trump's Vendetta Against Jeff Bezos Could Destroy the Postal Service," Vanity Fair, April 13, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/119676?t=10&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

4. "Coronavirus job losses could total 47 million, unemployment rate may hit 32 percent, Fed estimates," NBC News, March 30, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/119371?t=12&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

5. "If the US Postal Service fails, rural America will suffer the most," Vox, April 16, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/119677?t=14&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

6. "Workforce Diversity and Inclusiveness," U.S. Postal Service, accessed April 18, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/119623?t=16&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

7. "The U.S. Postal Service is Owned by the People—Let's Keep it That Way," AFL-CIO, April 23, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/119678?t=18&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

8. "The U.S. Postal Service Needs Help Now: 'The Situation Is Absolutely Dire,'" New York, April 17, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/119679?t=20&akid=262286%2E3735812%2EtK2lOk

Want to support our work? The MoveOn community will work every moment, day by day and year by year, to resist Trump's agenda, contain the damage, defeat hate with love, and begin the process of swinging the nation's pendulum back toward sanity, decency, and the kind of future that we must never give up on. And to do it we need your ongoing support, now more than ever. Will you stand with us?

Yes, I'll chip in $5 a month.

No, I'm sorry, I can't make a monthly donation.

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