Op-Ed: Taking Trump’s word on the US Postal Service is key to saving it

The president has acknowledged, as recently as April 5, that rural America has an internet accessibility problem. This likely contributes to the fact that 18 percent of Americans pay their bills by mail – a not insignificant portion of the population, and a larger group than those who pay bills via online banking.

There are reasons beyond convenience to support a well-funded and competently managed national postal service – reliable mail service quite literally saves lives. With fewer and fewer health care facilities in rural communities, 20 percent of Americans rely on the mail system to receive prescription medications. In 2019 alone, the USPS delivered 1.2 billion prescriptions, including nearly 100 percent of the prescriptions ordered by the Department of Veterans Affairs.

There are other health benefits to having access to the USPS. Being in the midst of a pandemic, as we are, and with an election looming, reliable mail service will enable Americans across the country to remain safe at home while still participating in democracy come November. USPS has a longstanding policy of delivering ballots even without correct postage – neither snow nor rain keeps our nation’s hardworking postal workers from ensuring the voices of the public are heard.

But this can only continue to happen if Trump and congressional Republicans allow it to happen, which is why it is so concerning that the integrity of the USPS seems wholly reliant on the president’s ever-changing mood.

If President Trump is concerned with public health, why not empower people to stay home? Encouraging vote-by-mail and shoring up the USPS so it can fulfill their critical role during a presidential election would go a long way in achieving this end. (We saw a preview of in-person voting during a pandemic with the Wisconsin primary.) And if he is concerned with voter fraud (which there is scant evidence to justify), he might consider asking his party to pass the not one, not two, but three election security bills they rejected last year.

Of course, we could take Trump at his word: he’s scared increased vote-by-mail means he will lose. And he’s willing to trade the wellness of those who rely on the mail for prescription medicine, families and small businesses that use the mail to pay bills, and the public health of an entire country to stop that from happening. Normally, I would be disinclined to take anything he says at face value, but the president is nothing if not self-serving – so this time, I’ll make an exception.

Heidi Heitkamp served as the first female senator elected from North Dakota from 2013-2019 and is co-founder of the One Country Project.

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Article source: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/12/op-ed-taking-trumps-word-on-us-postal-service-is-key-to-saving-it.html