Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 08222020 20240712

If you are confident in the u. S. Postal service, we want to hear from you at 202 7488000. If you are not confident in the Postal Service, we want to hear from you at 202 7488001. And we are going to open special lines this morning. Postal workers, we want to know what you are seeing and what people are saying to you. We want to know what is going on in your post office. Postal workers, your line is 202 7488002. Keep in mind, you can always wet us at 202 7488003 and are always reading on social anda, at cspanwj facebook. Com cspan. Dejoyster general louis has been on capitol hill all week long, talking to senators about the u. S. Postal service. Lets start by reading a little bit from the wall street journal;s story on the congressional hearing s storyon journal on the congressional hearing. Louis dejoy said the post office could handle mailin ballots this fall, amid concerns from democrats particularly that his actions will interfere with the election. Dejoy has been at the center of efforts to curtail costs and appeared friday before the Senate Homeland security and Governmental Affairs Security Committee controlled by republicans. Senator rob portman, who says he votes every year by mailin ballot, asked if he supported mailing voting. I think the American Public should be able to vote by mail, mr. Dejoy said. We will invoke processes and procedures that promote election mail, and some classes ahead of first class mail. Dejoy testified he never spoke to President Trump on the Postal Service, other than receiving congratulations as postmaster general. In opening remarks, he urged congress to provide the Postal Service with Financial Relief to account for the impact of the covid19 pandemic on their financial condition. The actions have been discussed and debated for years, but no action has been taken, he said, referring to the agency operations, while adding the Postal Service must do its part to adapt to the reality of our marketplace. Logistic a former representative, has fought which postal representatives have blamed for deliveries that are delayed. Complaints have spilled over to concerns on the election, and which mailin voting is expected to hit Historic Heights because of the coronavirus pandemic. Democrats said mr. Dejoy was slow to respond to inquiries and they said harmed businesses and individuals. They say his actions are financially responsible and he is pressed to address delays and to make other commitments not to this service. Do you have confidence in your Postal Service . Lets go to the phone lines and talk to rodney, calling from texas. Rodney is not confident in the post office. Yes, i had confidence in the post office until trump put dejoy in there, and i get my medicine through the mail, and now it is coming late. How i determined that is because he started to take out mail orders, and trump knows that the democrats vote him out and more people will vote through the mail and vote him out, and they e to put dejoy in ther slow the vote so votes will not get counted. Host a lot of the republicans pointed out in the hearing yesterday that the post office has had trouble for a long time, not just recently. When did you notice your medicine started coming in slowly, this year before this year . Caller this year. They would tell them when it was shipped on the internet, and they would tell me i would get it. Before, i would get it two days to three days before it would get here it was supposed to get here. Last time, it said it was supposed to be there friday, and i did not get it until tuesday and it came first class through the mail in california. Host are you noticing it anything are you noticing it with anything else besides your medicine and how often to use the post office . Caller i pay my bills and i used to be able to mail it in two days to three days before it was due, and it has been late one or two days. The mail is definitely slowing also,n texas, and sometimes i get my neighbors mail. And in a rural route, sometimes get their mail put in my mailbox, so that tells me they are in a hurry and they are just putting it in the mailbox, so i will put their mail back in the mailbox. There has definitely been cutbacks and i think it is all coming from dejoy and a third party telling him from trump telling the thirdparty how to slow it down. He is trying to cheat to win the election. Host lets go to dori, calling from spokane, washington. Dori is confident in the post office. Good morning. Caller good morning. News ofs my daily. Verything about the post office, whatever it takes to keep the post office totally funded and totally working and it has to remain that way. There is no reason why they so pushed and we are onto the internet, but what happens on the internet goes . I think the post office should be made so even if the internet goes, we still have the communication of the post office are all sorts of reasons, not just this country but the entire world. Host dori, how often do you use the post office . One of the things we heard in the Senate Hearing this week is that the number of actual pieces of mail delivered by the post office is going down. Do you still using it on a weekly basis . Caller every day. My post office box mail forwarded to my house, and and theth the po box mail carrier, and the entire world would just crumble if something happened to the post office. They should be totally funded. Whatever it takes. And whatever it takes to do it. I dont care who has the office. It has remain absolutely perfect. Postmaster general louis dejoy appeared before a Senate Committee and he was asked by voteor rob portman about by mail and handling of mailin ballots pretty resort he had to say. [video clip] on this panel, i want to make sure we have an election that is wellrun, where people have their votes counted and many are going to use the post office. Mr. Dejoy, do you support absentee voting and voting by mail generally . I voted by mail for a number of years. The Postal Service will deliver every ballot and process every ballot in time. I appreciate that. So you do support voting by mail. I think the American Public should be able to vote by mail and the Postal Service will supported. I guess that is yes. To richard,talk calling from iron mountain, michigan. Richard works for the post office. Good morning. Caller good morning, thanks for having me. Host what are you seeing in your local post office where you work . Caller i am in my 41st and final year of working for the post office. Yes, the letter volume is down. Our flat volume, which are magazines and newspapers, are down. Our parcel volume is way up. The falsecern is information that is being put out by our president. He is making it sound like mailin voting is just a blanket how do i put it . A blanket mailing of ballots to houses, which is completely untrue. We deliver to the people we know. We know the people that live on our routes. We do not deliver to dogs or children. So there is a falsehood. The postmaster general yesterday say taking out the mail sorting equipment will not slow things down. If it is not sorted by mail machine, and has to be done by hand. I am very concerned about mailin voting. Host richard, we heard a lot also about staffing on the Postal Service. Where you worked, do you now see more workers or fewer workers to handle the mail that comes through . Caller in the carrier side of things, where i work, we do not see the clerks very often. You have enough clerks to sort the mail that we get in our small facility. We have a male sorting facility and our sister city, but i never see how many people they have there. We have no trouble getting our mail here, but i dont know how much it is piling up in our sister city, kingsford, which is two miles away. Host are you getting different reaction from people that you encounter when you are out on your route . The Postal Service has been the topic of news for the last week or so. What are you hearing from the people you run into when you are on your route . Caller most of the people are appalled by what is going on. They are so supportive of the carriers, especially, because they know that we are the last line. We seethe last people that deliver their essential goods. Say, 99 ,em i would are in favor of keeping the Postal Service vital. Think hard, do you is there enough mail to continue monday through friday delivery and in some places still saturday . Is there enough mail to continue that from your point of view . Caller absolutely. Six day delivery is essential and or delivery is essential. That is another point i would like to bring up. If this Postal Service is privatized, which is the ultimate goal, it would mean fewer delivery dates for the deathnd that is now. People there will not be door delivery anymore. They want to put cluster boxes on street corners, and people of all ages, including the elderly, will be walking two blocks to three blocks to get their mail. The result of that would be fewer routes because carriers will have to make fewer stops. So there are a lot of things that are not being said about what would happen if the Postal Service is privatized. Host richard, you said you had been at the Postal Service for decades. You know about the big deficit that the post office is running. Every time there is a hearing, people talk about how much money the post office is losing. How do you turn that around . Caller i would start saying this all started in 2006 with the stroke of a pen concerning the prefunded health care to the tune of over 5 billion that the post office has had to contribute, and no other company has ever had to do that before. This is prefunded health care for people who are not even born yet, which makes no sense to me. I would like to know where that money is that has been taken out of the Postal Service. Host lets go to tony, calling from bradenton, florida. Good morning. Caller good morning. Good morning, sir. Host good morning morning, go ahead, tony. Caller i do believe in the post office. We have it in the civil war. There is problem with the post like theye problem is said that sampson everything is going to be expensive. Who is going to get said that stamps and everything is going to be expensive and who is going to get richer . Theine they could raise stamps for only god knows. , i mean, het, dejoy needs to be removed and prosecuted because that is what trump is doing. Democracyroying the institutions, and this is a perfectly good example. That is the whole point. He needs to be removed. The republicans do not put it in the care act because 25 million was going to go to the post office. Everybody knows trump is trying to cheat. He is a cheater. That is the only way they win by cheating and Voter Suppression and gerrymandering. You name it. These people have no shame. Host lets go to dahlia, calling from miami, florida. Good morning. Caller good morning. What i want to say about the post office is i have had several bad experiences, and it has not been lately but going on for years. Have seen my post person come in, drop a box in front of our door. My husband and i looked at ourselves and said, did you order . He opened the door and it is not even our name or address. He went after her and she says, oh, i thought it was for you. That is ridiculous. Last year for christmas, i ordered dolls for my granddaughter, and i go to the computer because i expected it when it was to be delivered, and i see it has already been delivered. It was not here. I paid over 100 for that doll. Icalled them up and said, if had known you were going to send this to the United States post office, i would not have ordered that doll. I clicked in a claim. They went to the post office, and that night, and 9 00 at night, i see the box and here outside my door. They never knocked. It was not a neighbor. So i dont know who it was. I have had mail that has never gotten there. I went to the post office one e to mail but education back medication sentiment has been that we did not need, and i sent another letter at the same time. I went to the post Office Inside and put it in there. It took over two weeks for both of them to get there. Th under thisot on mans command. That was a long time ago. Host lets talk to tom, calling from bethlehem, pennsylvania. Tom works for the post office. Good morning. Caller good morning. Host go ahead. Caller i do not work for the post office. I worked for the post office. Host you are retired or moved on to another job . Caller i retired from the federal service. Host what do you think about what the post office and how it is working now . Caller what do you think about how the post office is working now . Host that is my question to you, tom. Caller that is also my question to you, sir. Mcaseelah,s go to from florida. Pronounce your name for me, please. Caller masakeelah. What money is saved by removing sorting machines . Well the Postal Service get a refund of the purchase or save on electricity . The Postal Service is a public ,ood, just like the military public schools, police stations, fire departments, roads, etc. None of the a for mentioned profit driven none of the a aformentioned are profit driven. Host lets go to kathleen. Caller first of all, i would like to express that the lady that was recently on, how she had so many problems with the post office in the past, i am sorry about that, but i just wanted to stress that from my experience, the Postal Service has been absolutely supportive. It has solved many of my problems over the years and recently. First of all, i am a senior citizen. I am a proud american. I rely totally on the u. S. Postal Service Every month for my Social Security. I have no savings. I rent only. , myly on my medical medications that come from the mail routinely every month, and if they dont, i am in trouble. I live on the edge. I am used to that, by the way, but that is ok. Just extremely serious what is happening in america right now, and i agree with the postal worker richard that the Postal Service cannot be privatized. And the big sorting machines, that were removed, there were quite a lot of them it sounded like, and they do hundreds of thousands of pieces of mail. They need to be put back ether or whatever to get things need to be returned from where they were in the recent past. President i do not want to say any names but this is an absolute, horrendous thing that is happening to our country , and it is only this country. They talking probably doesnt like the national mail, course. So i am. Month,want to say every and i am sure there are other millions of people, not just seniors, but other people. Disabilities,ith all ages, of course, they are going to be horribly affected. The element of routine is crucial, and i feel that the most Important Institution in this country is our United States postal system. Host lets go to willis, calling from clarksburg, west virginia. Willis is not confident in the post office. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I am kind of not confident in i hadg my mail because one Life Insurance statement that i never got, and i had to call them to say my insurance statement collapsed and i had to put that Monthly Payment on my credit card because i did not receive a statement. And here in west virginia, i understand it. We have five states that are serviced out of charleston, west virginia. Get thee before we money, wevice anymore should think about who could we put in their that could be responsible for making sure that the money is used correctly instead of maybe wasted . Upelieve it is all a set removing these machines to slow the mail so we cannot have the election so that they can blame it on the mail. T is not the letter carriers before it gets to them, i dont have a problem with them. It is just a mail marketing delivered. Again, postmaster general louis dejoy was in front of a Senate Committee on friday. While he was there, he talked a little bit about the removal of the public blue postal boxes. Here is what he said. [video clip] today, there are about 140,000 collection boxes in the United States. Over the last 10 years, it averaged about 3500, so 35,000 of them have been removed. It is a data driven method. I have not reviewed it, it every year they look at the utilization of postal boxes and where they place new boxes and red communities grow. , since myr 10 years arrival, we removed 700 collection boxes, of which i had. O idea that that was a process when i found out about it, we what the excitement it was creating, so i decided to stop it. We will pick it up after the election, but this is a normal process that has been around since you know, 50 years. The last 10 years, we have pulled back about 35,000. Host lets see what some of our social media followers are saying about the post office this morning. Here is one text that came in and said, i just received a firstclass envelope in mountain view, california, from san jose 10 miles away. It took 14 days. Even if Congress Allocates more money to the Postal Service, there will be no assurance President Trump and his cohorts will not still slow or halt the mail in october to steal the election. That says thet post office is overwhelmed with a volume o post of mail and packages prayed they need to separate the mail from the packages and put disorders back. Another text says, i am confident in the post office. It is a delivery mechanism for the empty ballots and return ballots. The problem resides in the voter rolls. If ballots are sent to people who are no longer there, however efficiently, the election will be seriously tainted. Trumps ultimate goal is to privatize the social service as a business for profit, and joy joy and joy sabotaging is the first step. I know people who have never had any sort of trouble with it. One last text that says, i have no confidence in the post office. Thist get my gas bill month, and the last package i got was for somebody else. I would never get my medication sent by mail. Once again, we want to know what you think about the u. S. Postal service and if you are confident. N the Postal Services delivery i went to note that louis dejoy will be in front of Congress Monday to week on testify in front of the House Oversight and Reform Committee. Remember, you can watch that hearing live here on cspan2, online at cspan. Org, or you can listen to it live on the free sarah span free cspan radio app. We will go back to our phone lines and start with george from new york, new york. George is a postal worker. Good morning. Caller good morning. Host george, what are you seeing at your location . Caller i am a retired postal employee and worked in management for 26 years in new york, so i know a lot of the processes that are required to dismantle machines and move collection boxes. It is a lot of painstaking data. It also takes time. It is not done even during this postmasters shortterm. You are making decisions for the future and you do not do it lightly, especially if it comes to revenue and sorting mail. My point is that one thing we cannot forget, this has been the playbook for the republicans for how long to try and break up the post office . It is money. They have big funding for health care, tons of money with retirement. They would love to shift that in the marketplace. You manage a market fund, and those people make any off of that. They get checks, salaries and bonuses when they manage the money. The big point is this 636,000 numberes, and the spinning in the news yesterday, they are union jobs. Just like anything attached with a union in america, they want to break that up in the peoples right to live safely, healthy, happy, decent wages, be part of the community, they do not want that. They want kings and queens and the rest of us to basically be subordinate to this process. Host how long ago did you retire . Caller about six years ago. Host there are some people who are in the congressional hearings and some this morning who said they have seen problems in the post office going back a long time. Sorry, go ahead. Every organization i lived through as a union manager i was able to keep my job in the next downsizing came about. This is about money to executives in the Postal Service. I signed a contract as a supervisor, manager and analyst that if i met my goals of getting overnight service up, and my job was to look at management process, evaluate routes, make changes for efficiency. You are not going to find a better dedicated group of individuals who work in the post office, but after that hard work for a year and being promised that if new york met the goals, management could basically get a 1 raise to their check and no annual raise but a little bit of a bonus at the end, my communication skills are at zero, so you dont get that. But the people who get it are the ones at the top because the corner of this money and save this district gets this piece of pie and if you make this goal, it will wrap the organization within a district, but they basically took that for themselves and told everybody else, your communication skills were bad, your processes were bad at the end. Not during any discussion or improvement plans or discussions to me, my managers or anything like that. I what are you going to do . Fight city hall . Work off shift, affecting your families livelihood . Host how do we fix all of this . I am hearing everything youre saying. How do we fix it . Caller look who is the head of the committee yesterday. The republican led johnson . Wasnt he involved in the ukraine matter with Gas Energy Companies and covering for giuliani . Look at all of these republican supporting trump. Go back to look before the election. They all hated him. They said exactly what he was. We need to get rid of Citizens United so money is out of politics. We need term limits, we need to prefund these elections and to get these media outlets, especially some of the social media and hold them accountable. Someone should be charged. Charge them a fee. Lets see if people have to pay for instagramming facebook every time they post something because you know what will happen . They will destroy this country and the Postal Service. And think of it, customers, listening now, howd you like to pay a weekly subscription like netflix to get your mail . Host lets go to thomas, calling from lincoln park, michigan. Good morning. Caller hello. Host go ahead, thomas. Caller i have confidence in the post office, but here in michigan, i caught a news story yesterday that 70 of the ballots cast in the last event at the election do not add up. So there is a problem and secretary of state is investigating. We will find out. Host ok. Taken earlierll this year that asked americans which federal agency they had the most confidence in. Which federal agency did they view favorably . Here are the results from the Pew Research Center. According to Pew Research Center , the u. S. Postal service was the highest Ranking Agency out of the viewed favorably by the majority of the public. In aprilericans back viewed the u. S. Postal service favorably. Than the centers for disease control, the census bureau, the health and human services, department of homeland security, Federal Reserve and irs. Americans viewed the u. S. Postal service in a favorable manner. Once again, this is back from april. The Government Agencies, the Postal Service is viewed the most favorable by the majority of the public. Lets go back to our phone lines and talk to kimberly, calling from new york. Good morning. Caller good morning. I just had two things. Im not sure why the Postal Service needs to make money. I do not know how much the fda brings in for us. The second thing is, you know, the biggest logistics contractor for the Postal Service is xpl. Louis dejoy owns 30 million worth of stock because it used to be his company in xpl. I think it is obvious he was going to benefit if the Postal Service has to be privatized. Huge amounts of donations for the republican bought his spot as the postmaster general. It is more criminality via the republicans. Thank you. Host lets go to fred, calling from new york. Good morning. Caller good morning. Host do you work for the Postal Service or do you retire . Caller i retired. Host how long did you retire . Caller just before covid broke. What were you seeing host host where you seen that your post Office Location . Caller before things broke out, everything was running accordingly, just the way it was. A little bit of mismanagement, but that is acrosstheboard throughout any Government Agency. You are going to have that. Post dealing with the crisis we have been dealing with, the people that i work with, my coworkers and whatnot, they have informed me that some of the things have been dismantled, machines have been taken out, whatnot. There are other things we should really be focusing on here. Host like what . Instance, do for you know what is causing a lot of the mail volume to really be overly bloated . Host what . Caller well, it is the amazon packages. All the prime membership, that has continued to work like clockwork. The budget cannot really afford it. But i have one thing to say, are you ready . Host go ahead, fred. Calling to charles, from florida. Charles, good morning. Caller good morning, sir. Hope your day is well. There is some disparities here. Packages that i purchased. I made purchases way back two weeks to three weeks ago, and they have not moved one inch from what i can see from the tracking numbers. Also, there seems to be a problem with getting packages delivered to the correct house. And it seems like it is all bull camille. Packet bulk mail. It seems like it is packages, and the Postal Service is having a problem delivering those to the correct house. I get my neighbors mail, and they get mine. Neighbors,or honest otherwise, there could be some terrible things going on as far as getting her mail. Getting our mail. Host how often do you go to a post office or is your only interaction through the mail carrier . Caller i do not go to the post office very often. However, when there is a disparity with Package Delivery and things like that, i do go to the post office and i tried to speak with the supervisor to let them know that the carriers delivered the mail to the wrong address. They always tell me that they are going to look into it, but the problem still continues. Have, on the other hand, i purchases that i made online that i bought and i tracked these packages, and they have not moved within three weeks, within three weeks time. I am not the only one that is experiencing this type of problem within the Postal Service. We need our Postal Service. Do not get me wrong. We appreciate what these guys do. These guys and girls deliver mail. And florida is hot. You were talking 100 degree weather out here, and they are out there pumping it. We appreciate what they do. It is not them per se, but, you know, stuff trickles down hill. It is sad to say. Something needs to be done and looked at at the top. Again, the u. S. Postmaster general louis dejoy was at a Senate Hearing on friday, talking about the state of the Postal Service. Well, senators at that hearing were debating each other on exactly whether these concerns about the post office are political or real. I would like to show you a couple of clips, the first from senator James Lankford on what he says is unfair criticism of the postmaster general, and we follow it up with the Ranking Member of the Senate Homeland security and Governmental Affairs committee, gary peters, responding to langfords statement. [video clip] never had any issues, never delays or mail that was late. There were never financial problems. There was never any challenge to mailin votings until 65 days ago when you arrived. Apparently, all chaos has broken out in the post office in the last two months. For that, there never seem to be a complaint about the post office ever, so i do want to thank you for your service, men and women around the country that do a remarkable job every day. Those folks in the unions, those folks taking care of us and getting things out, taking care of firstclass mail, taking care of all of those things. I appreciate your service and the fact you have stepped up to lead an organization that desperately needs help that congress for two decades has pounded on postmasters on why they are not doing reforms and why we have not found more efficiencies. You step into this role and it looks like you have taken the work from the Inspector General and the work from the Regulatory Commission and said, lets start implementing some of these things, and now congress is shifting from beating up on postmasters for not doing work now beating up on you for actually doing the work. I just want to be very clear about what i have been hearing, and i think you heard from my members, and to counter with the chairman said, these are real concerns i am hearing. These are not manufactured. These are people coming forward, talking about delays, talking about medicine unavailable for had thisking about i story with an individual that because of a lack of medicine, skipped doses, was actually hospitalized. Those are very real. When i hear those stories, we stand. That is my job. It is the job of every senator here to stand up for our constituents and the people back home who are hurt to make sure their voices heard. That is what this is about, making sure peoples voices are heard. That is what this is hearing that is what this hearing is about and that is why we are making sure the Postal Service does what they have done with integrity. We want to make sure that standard continues going forward. I fully appreciate that the covid has created significant problems for the Postal Service. I will not show my chart again, but if you look at the chart, the service was there through a lot of the pandemic. It has just been in the middle of july where it drops off dramatically. Covid has been with us since march, but we have seen a dramatic drop in midjuly, which is the time when i got those medications and my colleagues getting those communications. These are not manufactured. They are real people. I just want to be clear about that. We want toagain, point out to you, as well, that the u. S. House will be coming back into session today to involving thetion u. S. Postal service. The house delivering for america act will start directly at the end of the show, live at 10 00 a. M. , here on cspan. Stick around after washington journal to hear the house actually debate and talk about the u. S. Postal service. In addition, the Washington Post reported earlier this week that the u. S. Postal service is planning major changes later this year. I will read to you a little bit from that story. The postmaster general louis far moreped out sweeping changes to the u. S. Postal service than previously exposed. Liveryd lead to lower and higher prices, according to several people familiar with the plans. The plans under consideration, described by four people familiar with Postal Service discussions, would come after the election and touch on all corners of the agencys work, including raising package rates, particularly when delivering the last mile on behalf of big retailers, setting higher prices for services and alaska, hawaii and puerto rico, curbing discounts for nonprofits, requiring ballots to use firstclass postage, and Leasing Services of Postal Service facilities to other Government Agencies and companies. Dejoy, a former ally of trump, envisioned aggressive costcutting newers that he and other conservative state are necessary to strengthen the financial footing of the agency. They would also represent the biggest reshaping of the agency and generations and likely draw severe criticism from people and organizations that rely on the mail service for timely deliveries, to clearly and populated regions of the country. Dejoy, the first postmaster general without a history in the agency as an agency and 28 years, began implementing policies within eight weeks of taking office in midjune. He temporarily backed out this week amid heavy criticism that the moves caused delays and mail delivery and could undermine those november elections, which will rely heavily on mailin ballots because of the coronavirus pandemic. Thats goodbye to our phone lines and see what you think. Do you have confidence in the United States Postal Service . Lets go to allison from maryland. Allison, good morning. Caller good morning. Have of people forget we an incredible agency called the postal inspection service. The postal inspectors make sure that they take care of the fog behind the scenes. They got the unabomber, and that cspanook out actually had on that goes officers that they are the fbi, for the fbi, and they keep a close watch on the fraud situation, and they are unsung heroes. Host lets go to floyd, calling from tolerance, tennessee. Good morning ill branch, tennessee. Good morning. Caller two points i want to make real quick. Ours of thehed h representatives discussing the Postal Service. Earlier on, they were talking about like they have 400 postal clerks out sick with covid, and theyve got like 4000 positions that are not filled. You cannot run the surface if you do not have the people. Covid is killing people all over this country, and the postal clerks are not immune. Has slowed down because of this disease. They need to let this man do his job and fix the system. Host lets go to rich, calling from tampa, florida. Rich, good morning. Caller good morning. Is rich in tampa, florida. I have been with the post office for 22 years now. I see some things that are very disturbing here in tampa. Host rich, do you work inside the post office or are you a mail carrier . Caller i work inside the post office. They have got our hands tied. They have got us overworked and underpaid. No mention of any overtime at all or you will get in trouble. More packages and mail delivered on saturday and sunday and not enough people to deliver the mail with all the packages stacking up left and right everywhere. Everybody is buying from amazon, prime, walmart and everything. We thought about doing a walkout. Host how long have you worked for the Postal Service, and has it gotten worse than what it was in the past . Caller 24 years. We have had our ups and downs and whatnot, but with this whole covid mess going on, and as soon withey started competing american ups, fedex and everybody, dhl on the weekend delivery, we are overworked. We are overworked and all the are in their truck for 10 to 12 hours a day and they are worn out. Some people are going to break here real soon. Host rich, what is the solution . Caller dissolution is is we need a bailout. We need President Trump to come through and take care of the Postal Service. We can take care of our citizens and people here. Biden and whats her name have no idea what they are doing. Trump is a businessman. He knows he needs to put money into it and get it done. We need to reelect President Trump. Host what do you say to the people who said earlier today that why sugar the Postal Service get more money when there mail and packages are showing up late now . Why put more money back into the post office . Caller it is going to get a whole lot worse here. Forget about the election. It is going to get a whole lot worse here if we do not get some help right away. We need a bailout. On friday,again postmaster general louis dejoy was in front of the Senate Committee. He talked a little bit about deliverye of the mail has taken place. Heres what he said. [video clip] are there certain delays greater in other areas than others . For instance, are delays greater in rural areas than they are in other parts of the country . Senator, i think more urban where the intimidation of the coronavirus, which scares us, our employee average has dropped about 4 . When you go into some of the hotspots, philadelphia, detroit, there are as much as 25 . And we have routes, like philadelphia has 750 routes, and we have days where we are short 200 carriers. This could go on for a while. So that is not the only contribution, but when the American People see two days, three days that they have not seen their carrier, that is an issue. Atould say that i think least 20 of those are at the descending level of consequence around the country. Host for all of our viewers, we want to remind you that the Republican National Convention Begins on monday. You can watch every moment live on cspan beginning at 9 00 a. M. Eastern, starting with the delegates meeting in charlotte, North Carolina, President Trump and Vice President pence for a second term. Once again, live coverage begins at 9 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan. You can also watch on cspan. Org and listen to it on the free cspan radio app. Lets see if we can get a few more calls before the top of the hour. We will start with tom, calling from cincinnati calling from new york. Caller good morning and thanks for taking my call. I am against this mailin ballot think the post office is not reliable enough for two points. Just use a Little Common sense here. I know many people who have had their mailboxes messed with. They have stolen mail. I have received other peoples mail i dont know how many times. I even got subpoenas. I had warrants put on the because i never got the subpoena. There wasnd point is a gentleman on earlier saying trump is trying to cheat the system. Well, what would you consider in a competition of somebody changing the rules during the competition that would be cheating. The election is a competition. You cannot just bring it up in the same year youre having an election that now we are going to change the rules. It is like my daughter same, new rule during a card game that we already started. You cannot do that. That is cheating. That is all it got to say, thanks. Host lets go to kevin, calling from windsor, connecticut. Good morning. Caller good morning, sir. My comment is that this his job,r tried to do and in 90 days from now, he is going to be out of that job, and this major move with the post office is politics. This is trumps dark world. Look at what is happening in i ran. Pompeii was trying to get our allies to back us up and they will not because trump flopped iran deal. Our streets are on fire. Look at what trump did to the agency, and look at the attorney general, trumps personal attorney. Yet, this is trumps dark world. God bless joe biden. Hopefully joe will be in here come november. Host lets go to richard, calling from palm coast, florida. Good morning. Caller hello, how are you today . Host just fine. Go ahead, richard. Caller listen, i spent 10 years of my life in the marine corps and then i went to work for the post office. I spent four years at the post office. The post office is just mismanaged. It has nothing to do with the postmaster general we have now. You have Union Leaders and anybody else who are in charge of what goes on inside the post office, and it has been mismanaged for over 30 years now. There are 79 billion over moneyt and they have got to spend for at least another year. [indiscernible] if you have been around washington long enough, that is where i grew up, you had carter marlin, because he cleaned up the post office and wanted it as a business. You could walk in any office right now and you would have to wait in line and wait in line, and let me tell you about this realistically, how many people send letters now persontoperson across the country . They are not. They sent text messages. Host we are hearing from a lot of our viewers and social media followers who say they do still send letters and they do still use the post office. The number is down, listening to postmaster general the joy, but dejoy, but a lot of people writing and on social media say they do use the Postal Service. Rebut that let me and i will say this to you, as a mail handler, which i used to push all the mail and cards, and ship them here and there, and take them off the machines. The amount of firstclass mail that goes through, theyll used to be gas bills, electric bills, car notes, and where is that all coming from now . The internet. The amount of mail volume is down drastically. Drastically. It is not like we are using anything it is just absurd, like i said. You have got a problem. All you have to do is go [indiscernible] lets be realistic. People thathave 500 sit in a building that make more money than most of the people who work for the place to have an idea what is going on inside of the building where they are managing it. Host richard, give us a quick solution before the top of the hour. How do we fix the Postal Service . One, you have got to get the people who are invested in the post office who have worked there, like myself, that no there are people who have some common sense and who know how to make it run and make the mail move. We have got to get the management inside the postal buildings to what is going inside and outside. Number two, this guy has been there 67 days. Out riding around in a truck and taking out mailboxes, he is out of mailsorting machines and you have congressman and they dont do anything about it. Host lets go to glenn calling from madison, illinois. Good morning. Caller good morning, jesse. Hey, we are kind of halfway in , and ours isere excellent. We get all the mail with no problems. A president here that is turned the white house into a funeral home the other day. He is using the white house grounds for conventions, and everybody just turns their head. It is about time they get on him. Host lets talk to cap drain from concorde, new hampshire. Good morning. Caller good morning. I have had this address for 41 years and i have been both pleased and displeased. I have been displeased and called the carrier, supervisor, and he spoke to the substitute mail person who was not doing their job. I have also called to complement do. For what they i do not have a computer, therefore, i am sending and receiving all kinds of firstclass mail every single week. One of my complaint is toward the taking out of the huge machines in the 50s. When i was working, when many come up many members of my family were working in a printing company, we had humongous, twostories high machines. When it was a slow season in the winter, some machines were offline. They were not discarded and dumped. And in the very, very busy season, from spring through summer, because we printed nonfiction and atlases and textbooks from first grade although it on through college, those machines iraran. After the 2008 worldwide monetary downturn, germany used that. The people did not have to work fulltime, they worked when it was busy and they took a smaller salary when it was not busy. Host we would like to thank all in. Ur callers for joining we will continue to talk about the u. S. Postal service. Coming up next, we will be joined by government executives s for a look at proposed changes to the Postal Service. We will be joined by two members of congress. First up, representative john of maryland and representative fred keller of pennsylvania. We will be right back. Next week, it is the republicans turn. Starting monday and for four days, here they are priorities for the next four years. Watch President Trump and Vice President pence accept the nomination for the election. Coverage begins monday at 9 00 eastern as delegates need to officially numb it President Trump and Vice President pence. Cspan,ve on livestreaming and ondemand at cspan. Org, or listen with the app. Cspan radio and before the conventions evening session, watch cspan at 6 p. M. Eastern for past Convention Speeches, with political commentator pat weekend and, former secretary of state colin powell, and former secretary of state condoleezza rice. Cspan,eeches only on your unfiltered view of politics. Washington journal continues. Host we are back with government executives Senior Correspondent eric katz who is your to talk about the latest in the proposed operational changes for the u. S. Postal service that could impact mailin voting in november. Good morning. Guest good morning. Host i am sure you watched postmaster general dejoy yesterday. What were some of the key moment you saw and what were your takeaways from that hearing . Guest there was a few key moments from my perspective. One was his commitment to treating election mailin ballots as prioritize prioritized mail, so even if states and municipalities send out mail using a cheaper rate that usually may be delivered more slowly, they will treat it as what they call firstclass mail. Bat settled some of the concerns that a lot of people had regarding how quickly those ballots would get delivered. However, there was another important moment and series of moments when the postmaster general defended the changes delays. E led to mail mails this notion that all should be going out on a set schedule, and that has in the last few weeks led to some mail being left behind because the tracks have to go out at extra time, regardless in the mail is ready to go and on the truck. And he admitted that that has led to delays. He said that they will be able to sort it out. It will get fixed. But the fact that he is pushing forward with that despite the backlash was i think a pretty big moment in that testimony. Host explained to us a little bit what you mean. You wrote about this in your story. Explain what you mean about that set schedule. He saying it is going to be a good thing if they know exactly when the trucks are leaving, instead of the trucks waiting on at the mail or something. How is that causing a problem tell us a little bit about that. Guest ultimately it could turn out to be a good thing, certainly that is the position the postmaster general is taking. However, in the interim what is ippening is, normally and have talked to a lot of the usps employees about this normally they have this mindset that all mail gets delivered every day, and if it is sitting there, then you have to get it out that day even if it takes an extra trip, even if you have to operate late into the night. You get that mail out. Ok,they are sort of saying, but truck is supposed to leave the plant to the distant mission center, then that has to leave at the to the distribution center, then that has to leave from the Distribution Centers of the post office at an exact time. What has happened is that if any of that process get disrupted and they are not waiting for the rest of the mail to come, they are just going on schedules. Itt has led to the mail, piles up each step of the way and has to wait until the next day. That is what has compounded. You can imagine the piles of mail that need to go out are sort of growing and growing, via postmaster general dejoys own admission. The mail delays have really spiked in the last few weeks. Most fish what are you calling 1 , 10 , 15 . Explain what you mean by a spike. Guest good question. Said it is around 4 less downime delivery, it is 4 . We have heard anecdotally that it is even more significant than that. They dont release their data october, so we will have to keep an eye out for that. We have heard some of these stories of medications being delayed, all these really important pieces of mail and that customers have never had issues with our suddenly being delayed. So we dont know exactly the numbers there, but it does seem to be noticeable. Host one of the things we have not talked about much this morning is how the u. S. Postal service was affected by the coronavirus pandemic. Were they considered essential workers . Did everybody at the post office continue working during the pandemic, or were some of them . Urloughed i cant imagine it was easy for them to work from home like other industries. Were some of these problems caused by the coronavirus pandemic . I think what were seeing now, especially with the delays is exacerbating a trend that was happening it has been actually from dust for several years, but especially did it has been actually for several years, but especially during the pandemic. Even imagine postal workers delivering your mail or in the processing plants sorting your mail, they had some issues with thousands of people they have a huge workforce. The percentages are not huge, but thousands and thousands of people getting sick with covid19. Thousands and thousands more having to quarantine because they had exposure to someone at work. They felt the impact of that inia operations and that their operations, and that led to a lot of callouts and delays. It also affected their finances. Mail. Are using the anytime there is a downturn, people use the mail less and them. As hurt we have seen an unprecedented spike in Package Delivery as people stay home and they are ordering things through ecommerce. That helped them out a lot, but it is a less profitable offering for the Postal Service compared to just your normal letter that you would get in the mailbox. Their overall finances have been negatively impacted. Host let me remind our viewers that they can take part in this conversation. We will open up our regular phone lines. This means republicans, your number will be 2027488001. Democrats can call 2027488000. Independents, your number will be 2027488002. You can always text us at 2027488003, and we are always on social media, on twitter cspanwj, and on facebook at facebook. Com cspan. Eric, what was the white houses reaction if any to the testimony from the postmaster general yesterday . Guest i have not heard the house church a reaction specifically to the testimony. They have been very supportive of the postmaster general and the changes he is trying to institute. They have tried they have played both sides, where they say, it is an independent agency, nothing to do with the changes they are making, while also explaining what is happening. President himself has also been very critical of the Postal Service while praising mr. Dejoy but criticizing the institution. To makehat they need certain changes especially as it relates to their pricing. Thehey fully support postmaster general, he has ties to the president s fundraising efforts. Is dejoy made clear this what he said under oath, that he has not talked to the president at all about any of the changes he is making or anything to do with the Postal Service. He has talked briefly to some officials let the treasury secretary, mceachin, but he said thes not really influencing post office. Host the house is coming back in at 10 00 a. M. Today for an unusual august session dedicated to the post office. What is a legislation that the house is working on . Guest the house is really looking at these changes that the Postal Service has undertaken and trying to reverse them at least through the end of the election. And basically go back to the same standards that the Postal Service had earlier this year before dejoy took over. It would also provide a cash influx, a cache in fusion for the Postal Service to help offset some of the money that some of the damage they have undertaken because of the pandemic. Office, the took postal Management Board of governors asked for 75 billion in Financial Relief. This bill, i believe, would provide 25 billion of that. Host does this bill have any chance of passing the house, and what are its chances in the senate . Guest i believe it will pass the House Democrats are pretty united on this and the House Republican leadership, they are against the bill. But there has been a lot of have spoken out against the postmaster generals changes, and have called on him to reverse them and have funding ormergency emergency appropriation for the agency. So we made the this as a bipartisan bill. In the senate, its prospects look for to grim look pretty grim. There has been republican support for some of these changes, but majority leader has not shown any interest in taking it up. I think he thinks the Postal Service will be just fine. I dont believe the white house will be into said in signing it even if it were passed. This might be more of a messaging type of bill than anything else. Host i would like to remind our viewers that lewis the joy the postmaster general testified before the senate on friday, and on monday, he will be in front of the House Oversight and Reform Committee. You can watch about here live at 10 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan two , cspan. Org and listen on the free cspan radio app. Eric, do we expect anything different than what we saw on friday coming from louis dejoy on monday in front of the house . I dont expect he will. Change his testimony much he may try to clarify a few things. When he was sort of caught up guard, it seems. Some democrats especially on the committee will come with some really pointed questions that are really going to press dejoy on some of these issues especially as it relates to mail and potential conflicts of interest in terms of his relationship with the president and his own private business , that have sort of intersected with the Postal Service. That didnt really come up at the Senate Hearing, so perhaps we could see that. I do expect him to get grilled more or less by some of the democrats in that committee. Let some of our viewers take part in the conversation. Richard is calling from pennsylvania on the democratic. Good morning on the democrats line. Good morning. Caller thank you for taking my call. I have a problem with this whole issue. We are changing the focus of our discussion to the post office and whether it is efficient or not efficient. The changes that were made, maybe they should not have been made. Congress going back and trying to appropriate more money, none of this is relevant. You know what the issue is, the issue is all these mailin ballots, there is no need for it. Absolutely no need for it. You go to day walmart, it is loaded with people. Sometimes waiting in line. Waiting in line at the checkout. There is no problem with that is there . But there is a problem going to the polls to vote. I dont believe it. I dont think too many people believe that. It is just something that makes absolutely no sense. There is no logic to it. Host eric, how will the post office handled mailin voting . Guest well, i think the important thing to keep in mind here is, of course, we are expecting a huge surge in the number of people that vote by even if every american voted by mail, which is certainly not going to happen but even if they did, it would be a tiny blip for the Postal Service in terms of their total volume. Ballots in the election mail to make up about volumeheir entire mail in the coming months. They are certainly prepared to handle it operationally, because it is a smaller surge than say they would say in the holiday season, around christmas. There are certain steps they usually take to make sure that the election mail is delivered promptly and that everyones vote is in on time, according to their state deadline. Was some controversy with the Postal Service sending letters to almost every state, warning them that they they a not need needing the warning them that they might not be meeting the timeframe to make those liveries. However, the Postal Service said, we are just try to work with the state to make sure they know how we operate so they can adjust their schedule as needed to make sure every ballot is counted. I think i said that at the outset of our conversation here, dejoy yesterday, the postmaster general, promised that these ballots would be treated like firstclass mail so that they are expedited. I think he said 95 he promised 95 of all election mail will be delivered within 13 days, which is their fastest delivery window. So i think as long as he follows through on that promise, that has eased a little bit of the concerns. Host lets go to randy calling from san bernardino, california. Good morning. Caller good morning. How are you doing . Host just fine. Caller thanks for having me. This is randy. I used to work for the Beverly Hills post office so i know the format. Hurts myt here really heart. We post office retired, most of them are veterans, ok . Most postal employees are veterans. I heard nothing about the corona thing. I try to keep my mailman the bathroom for my house if he needs it, some water. What they are doing is pretty criminal. It is obvious. I think everybody just request absentee ballots and take them to your polling thing register and drop it off. I dont see no problem if everyone first they tell us to not go out, try to avoid that. Trying to get hold of what is going on to save lives. Host go ahead and respond to her, eric. Do you have anything to say . Theres certainly options in a lot of states where, even if you get the ballot by mail, you can drop it off physically in person. I know in washington, d. C. Where live, there is drop boxes specifically for ballots setting up all around the city. So that is one option. A lot of states now are just sort of trying to say, get the ballot in at least one week early so that way we have no concerns. Saidostmaster general yesterday, if you sent it in a week early, guaranteed that it will be delivered on time. So there are options for voters. Of course, you can also just go to the polls and vote normally, but there are safety concerns , people have given the pandemic so that is why we are seeing a surge in mailin. Allots host lets talk to john, who is calling from syracuse, new york. Good morning. Caller how are you doing, guys. Host go ahead, john. Caller i have been working at the Postal Service for 37 years and i have seen a lot of changes years. E 47 one thing that hasnt changed is the Postal Service takes mail seriously. Before this pandemic, when hardly anyone voted absentee ballots, we still took it seriously. We take it more seriously than first class mail. And that was when nobody votes. E there will be a lot more people absentee voting. We can handle it easily. This is not anything we cant handle. You know what i mean . If there is any company that is too big to fail, its the post office. I took four amazon trucks yesterday, i took a ups truck, dhl, fedex, these companies depend on the Postal Service. They could hire thousands more people and do it themselves, but it is easier for them to dump it on us at the post office and redo the last mile. The post office and we do the last mile. The Postal Service can do this. Everybody in the country wants to do mailin voting, we can still do it easily. Host go ahead and respond, eric. Guest yeah, like i was saying, it is a pretty small portion of their overall volume. I think the caller is exactly right. This is something the Postal Service can easily absorbed into their normal operations. Twofoldern is sort of can the Postal Service do this . Do they have the capacity, and the answer is pretty clearly yes. The other question is, are they these other changes happening that may cause thousands to be delivered late . We have seen deliveries go up. We dont know really how bad it is because the data has been not made available yet. That is normal, it comes out on a quarterly basis. Is something that lawmakers are looking at and observers of the Postal Service are looking at. There was a concern in the conversation,his over the last few weeks, i mean, about the Postal Service. The president amplified that they needed a funding boost in order to deliver these ballots. That is not really the case, i mean, the Postal Service finances have taken a hit, and they could certainly use the , which the committee on commerce will be talking about later today and voting on, but in terms of being able to operate during the election they have enough cash on hand to do that. They will have the capacity to absorb an influx. Host before we let you go, we will get some more calls in. I want you to talk about the stories you wrote earlier this month. The United States Postal Service seeking a pricing surcharge on season. For the holiday you wrote the u. S. Postal service is seeking authority to temporarily raise prices on its commercial package offerings, looking to boost revenue during its busiest season of the year. The increases would last from october 18 to december 27, and institute a rate surge of around 8 depending on the products. Tell us what is going on with that. Has this been approved . Who will this affect. Host it is still pending review before the Postal Services regulator . Guest the Postal Regulatory Service commission. They are in a competitive space, meaning they are not the only ones who deliver packages, there is ups and fedex, there is a from melody in terms of the approval. It is definitely expected to be init is merely a formality terms of the approval. It is definitely expected to be approved. As far as who it will affect, they are saying it is only affecting commercial offerings, so the individual customer wont much. Ing this as so if you are going to your local post office with a box and shipping it somewhere, the rate for that will not change, it is more the commercial side of things. Real quick, when you say the commercial side of things, do you mean this is for the businesses who will be shipping things, like when you buy something from a store, they will be paying more. Guest yeah. Essentially that gets passed on to the customer, ultimately. We will have to see. Mailerse largescale operating a business or Something Like that, those are the ones who would feel the impact of this. They are doing this sort of in response to the fact that their biggest competitors, like ups or fedex, have also seen a surge because packages, so many people are getting packages delivered and this will help them meet that surge and make more money off of it. Host we have one more caller. Lets talk to pat, calling from royal oak, michigan, on the republican line. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thanks for taking my call. What you were just talking about, if that money then gets to the employees for overtime during that season, this is a Smart Business move by the Postal Office. I am from michigan, so gary peters is my senator. He is sending mixed messages. I see a parallel and a crossover with coronavirus. They state one thing and then the solution does not match up with what they hyped up. Gary peters was saying that people arent getting their checks for medicare and they are not getting their medications, yet he wants to burden them more, the Postal Office. While we have covid employees , or not coming to work because they have aging parents or something, so i think there is an inconsistency there and a lack of clarity in solution finding, and i sure hope someone steps up. Especially gary peters. , like you were just saying, mailin ballots, but you have to deliver them to your precinct. Host go ahead and respond, eric. Guest the caller is correct about senator peters, he is the top democrat on the committee yesterday where dejoy testified and has really become the democrats point person on social issues in the senate. He has been very critical of a lot of these changes, was really pointed in his questioning with the joy. With dejoy. On the overtime issue that the caller brought up, but has definitely been a cause of concern because the Postal Service has sort of quietly may of instructedsort employees to not take as much overtime. We have heard that anecdotally throughout the country, that that has sort of impacted their ability to deliver everything on time, because they rely on overtime to make sure everything is out the door. The joy defended that and said i have never told anyone to not take over time, but we are hearing at the local level that that has trickled down. While overtime is available and being used, it is not as frequent as it used to be. Host we would like to thank eric katz, senior government correspondent. Eric, thank you so much. Guest thank you. Always great to talk postal. Host coming up next come up we went to here once again from you about your confidence level in the u. S. Postal service. You see the numbers on the screen. Postal workers, we especially want to hear from you. We will be right back. Postmaster general louis dejoy and robert duncan, chair of the u. S. Postal Service Board of governors, testify before Congress Amid concern about changes to Postal Service operations, and their impact on the upcoming november elections. Monday at 10 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan two, before the House Oversight and Reform Committee. Watch live coverage on monday at cspan2, ondemand at cspan. Org, or listen live where you are on the free cspan radio app. Washington journal continues. Host once again, we want to hear from you about your confidence level in the Postal Service, but before we go to your call, we want to remind you broadcastingill be the Republican National convention beginning on monday. Moment liveh every here on cspan beginning at 9 00 a. M. Eastern. Delegates . Th the meetingin charlotte, North Carolina tournament it President Trump and Vice President pence for a second term. Live coverage begins at 9 00 a. M. Eastern on seized in we can actually see some 9 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan. We can actually see the preparations for the rnc at the white house. Already starting at the white house. Again, you can watch it here starting at 9 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan. Once again, we will open up our phone lines to you. We want you to tell us about your confidence in the u. S. Postal service. The numbers are, if you are confident in the Postal Service, the number will be 2027488000. If you are not confident in the Postal Service, your number is 2027488001. If you are a postal worker, current or retired, i want to hear from you. I want to know what you saw, what you see in the Postal Service now, or what you saw before you retired. Your number will be 2027488002. Keep in mind, you can always text us at 2027488003, and we are always reading on social media, on twitter at cspanwj, and on facebook at facebook. Com cspan. We are going to start off with paul calling from north las vegas, nevada. Good morning. Caller good morning. I am 69 years old. The Postal Service has always gotten its job done. People need to remember when somebody says they are losing money, it is stipulated in the constitution that they are not a moneymaking organization. They are supposed to deliver the mail doing whatever it takes to do that. So anytime we have representatives that say fedex does better or ups does better i am not interested in them. The government is supposed to have delivery of mail and they get the job done. I just wanted to add one other thing, makes this kind of interesting. , have total confidence in them but they also are individuals allowed to vote. The postal union, the union that governs over 300,000 postal workers, endorsed mr. Biden. So i just want to add this they are disqualified from delivering ballots because, if you are handling ballots for the opposing candidate but you have backed a different candidate, how can you handle the ballots of the opposition . Host so do you think Election Officials around the country dont vote . Caller no, they can vote, but if you back one candidate that you are handling the ballots because you delivered the mail and your union backs that candidate, so they back mr. Biden. Now, suppose from the republican jurisdiction, they are bringing republican ballots in big bags, how do we know some of the bags are going to make it . Host do you think youre on Election Officials are not registered Party Members . Caller Election Officials are, but they are politically biased because they host the Election Officials are politically biased because they are Party Members . I am trying to make sure what you are saying. Caller what i am saying is, as postal workers whose union has biden, how can they be permitted to handle ballots for mr. Trump . Host i am trying to make sure i understand, and make sure you understand as well that Election Officials also are Party Members and also support one candidate or the other. What would be the difference between the people counting the ballots, and the people delivering the ballots . Caller well, that does make life interesting. That is where we have to make sure that every ballot from every individual, if we are going to do this mailin balloting, gets where it has to go without bias. Host lets go to kelly who is calling from clemens, North Carolina. Good morning. Kailey good morning. I wanted to say everybody is saying that trump has appointed dejoy. Well, that is not exactly true, he is put in there by a postal board of governors. He was voted upon by the senate in a bipartisan vote. There by trumps hand. That thented to say Postal Service, from what i hear from the news is actually funded until august of next year. And he said the only money he needed was for the covid problems that they had had in taking care of the covid. They would be why doing that. Also, i wanted to say that i am really not confident, after i have read some stories and seen some problems with postal workers actually being caught in fraud. Host that good ticket calling from this test kit lets go to kit, calling from arkansas hi, good morning. How are you this morning . Oh am fine. Go ahead i am retired from the Postal Service. I am also a disabled veteran and i dont know how they plan on handling all this stuff if you are going to take all the machines and Everything Else out of the post office that would help them to deliver more mail. Dejoyld like to have th tell me how many letters come through that machine. And he is going to take them out, he is going to lose that much mail. He will not be able to get them back. The only reason they are doing this with the Postal Service is because trump has everybody under his finger. He tells them what to do and when to do it and all that kind of stuff. The Postal Service dont need to be changed. Oy need to change that thdaj fella. He will notbe have the Postal Services value in hand. Host lets go to betty calling from green bay, wisconsin. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking the call. , agree with the last gentleman because 91 of the people agree with the Postal Service. Farmer areas, we order our chicks for the farmers and because of the delay, thousands of chicks were dead. They all died because they were held back. Ort do you farm yourself, this is something you country. Live in the i remember going to the Postal Service once in a while and i could hear the chicks. When they are delivered, they come it has always been all these years. And they were being held back and they all died. And this is not just wisconsin, it is others, you know . It was just unbelievable, because they didnt check what was negative if they went through this or not. Believe me, it is negative. And i am not the only one. I have heard so many people saying that. Will their checks come in . One guy had to drive 60 miles to get his prescription because it wasnt in time. I mean, they are not agreeing with the people. So what does that mean . All right. Host lets go to iran who is calling from greensburg, pennsylvania ron calling from greensburg, pennsylvania. Caller good morning. I hear people saying they want to thank postal workers for their service as if they are equating it to military service. I think that is crazy. Letter carriers make 20 an hour. They are getting paid to do the job, it has nothing to do with service as if you were in the marine corps or Something Like that. Number two, if you look at the election when bush and gore were so close and it came down to florida, it was several hundred votes and if you are mailing in your vote and you are not guaranteed to be counted, then you are disenfranchised. It wouldnt take a lot of a huge error on the part of the post office to misplace 200, 300 votes. I mean, out of the millions that were cast in florida. I think that is a huge concern. Only when you can guarantee your vote is counted the only way you can guarantee is to go to the polling place and push the button or pull the lever. It is the only way. Host lets go to ms. Calling from florida, good morning. Caller good morning. I dont think trump has anything to do with the mail being messed up. I have lived in florida for him at 50 years. I lived in one place for 20 years and i had my mail all of a sudden marked as undeliverable, my bills were sent back. I had to purchase a po box which cost me 100 some dollars a year. Now i live in a condo. I sent a package out and put three stamps on it. Instead of the mailbags taking it from the mailbox to the post office, he puts it back on top of the mailbox. There need to be reformed there. They are not doing their jobs right. It has nothing to do with politics, it has to do with reform and them not doing their jobs. People need to go out and vote in person like the other gentleman said. If you can go to walmart, you can go out and vote. Thank you for taking my call. Host i want to go back to an issue in caller brought up earlier in the show about the live animals shipped in the mail, the baby chicks. I want to read a story by the Associated Press about this 4800 chicksleast shipped to farmers in recent weeks have arrived dead. U. S. Representative shelley pin agree said this Shelley Pingree said that she is raising the issue of the dead chicks and the losses farms are facing in a letter to the postmaster and the u. S. Department of agricultural commissioner, sonny perdue. Pauline henderson, who owns the pinetree poultry in maine, told the newspaper she was shocked last week when all 800 chicks sent to her from pennsylvania were dead. Usually they arrived every three weeks like clockwork, she said, and out of 100 birds, you may have one or two that died shipping. Thousands of birds that move through the Postal Service Processing Center in sure is very, massachusetts were also dead. Steve, a spokesman for the United States Postal Service said the agency, cannot locate a claim being filed for this loss. Some animals including live chicks can be mailed safely under proper conditions. Again, we are talking about the u. S. Postal service whether you are confident in the United States Postal Service. Lets talk to richards is calling from hampton, new hampshire. Good morning. Caller good morning. I am a retired postal worker and i want to take issue with the policy of the postmaster general to remove the sorting machines. I was working at the Postal Service in the 1980s and 1990s, when we first put those machines in place. The purpose of those machines was to automate the sorting of mail. If you pull this machines out, this these machines out, we will have to refer it to manual distribution. Sense. S no it doesnt make sense to put in a system that is efficient, that is cutting down on the manual distribution of mail as one caller mentioned those machines process 35,000 pieces of mail ian hour. Pull those machines out and who will process that mail . It is like saying my business has dropped off so i will throw away half my tools. Millions ofes cost dollars. I dont understand his logic of pulling them out. I wish something would be done in these hearings on monday to ensure these machines are put back in place to do the job, to handle the volume of ballots that are going to be coming in. Thank you. Host the caller just brought up, and i just want to remind people that on monday, louis general,e postmaster will be testifying in front of the House Oversight and Reform Committee. You can watch up at live at 10 00 a. M. Here on cspan2, on cspan. Org, and of course, you can always listen to it on the free cspan radio app. Lets look at what some of our social media followers are saying about the u. S. Postal service. E is one from texas, says i spent a lot of time shouting at the tv during the hearing, but the most important thing is that it is the Postal Service, not a business for profit. U. S. Taxpayers pay for this sorting machines. I expect them to be used. Fund of the Postal Service. It belongs to the people of this not the whims of congress or the maniacal rantings of a very stable genius. Said, thexter postmaster general does not require senate confirmation. The most recent postmaster general was selected unanimously by the board. Another texter says i just received skip that one. I have renewed confidence in the Postal Service. I did not get mail one whole week in july. This has never happened in my lifetime. At least once a week, i dont get my mail. One last texter said yes, i have overwhelming confidence in the usps. I have only lost one piece of mail in 45 years of mailing my bills. What the joy and trump have implemented to slow the mail down is unamerican and unpatriotic. They both need to move to russia where they belong. Lets get some more calls in. Lets talk to edward, calling from south carolina. Good morning. Caller good morning and thanks for taking my call. I am confident the post office will be able to deliver mail according to their guidelines. The biggest problem with some of the governors that you can guarantee that it would get there in three days and that is not within their guidelines. But this whole thing with the post office is a red herring, because the problem is not with withts getting in, it is them being fraudulent. There is nothing to do with the post office, as to the accuracy and whether the voter was entitled to vote and so forth, and actually did vote. I thinkar as that goes, the democrats are throwing up in a red herring and going after the post office and trying to mute the problems with the accuracy and the validity of the ballots themselves. Host President Donald Trump has just tweeted about mailin balloting. We want to bring that to you that the president just put out he says, in new jersey, they want you to certify that you asked for the universal mailin ballot they sent you, but you never asked for you. Disaster in the wings. This came out just a few minutes ago from President Donald Trump. Balloting atailin the post office is a topic on everyones mind. Lets go to sweetie calling from durango, colorado. Good morning. Caller good morning. Colorado has been a mailin ballot state for over 70 years. It is safe, secure, and the ballots are verified by a bipartisan Election Group in our county offices. I support the post office by buying stamps and shipping through the post office. They come through rain or sleet, hail or snow. They are veterans, and many veterans get ther their medications through the mail. Flagship,trumpron and i cant wait until november until he is gone. Host let me ask you this quick question since you have already used mailin balloting, what do you do if you dont receive a ballot . In a place like colorado where you have mailin voting, how do you get a replacement one if you never got one in the mail for whatever reason . Caller i call the county Clerks Office and they will mailin ballot to your address mail a ballot to your address. Ballots are not forwarded, so you must change your address when you move. But we have found it to be very safe and very secure, and believe it or not, republicans get elected in colorado through the mailin ballots. Host lets go to robert who is calling from frostburg, maryland. Good morning. Caller good morning. How are you doing this morning. Host fine, go ahead. Caller i am a vietnam veteran. I started working in the post office in 1967 and i stayed there until i retired. I cannot believe what is happening to my country right now. These federal agencies have in dismantled. The president all of the cabinet members themselves, a ben carson has been fired, create, retired, so many of these guys are in jail. I dont understand how he keeps bringing along Good American citizens who believe in him and b. S. Ing them all the way. He is destroying a great institution, and people blindly follow this man. He will keep, repeating lies and people will believe him. He is the best at it. I pray, i pray that we will get some integrity back in our government. But if it keeps going the way it is going, we will not have a government. Thank you. Host lets go to james who is calling from corpus christi, texas. Good morning. Caller good morning and thank you for taking my call. I love washington journal. My concern is i live in an apartment, and there is so much mail delivered to people who are no longer at the address. In general, people move every six months or a year. I have been here for five years and i still get mail for several other people with their names on my address. And so, every day when i go down to the post to pick up my mail, people have moved in and there instance, i saw three different names on an apartment number from someone who checked their mail and it wasnt them so they just stuck it in the wall of the little postal shack. So my concern is that people who want to vote by mail, their ballot may be being sent all over the place, and you just cant trust it. I am totally behind the United States Postal Service, it is not their fault. They do a great job. Understandhave to that my situation is just one little apartment area and there are i dont know, thousands of millions. How many people move every six months these days . You know what i am saying . Thank you very much. Host lets go to valerie calling from berkeley, california. Good morning. Caller good morning. I am calling because i am very confident in the post office. The only thing that got me this time was, i am up here doing my bills and wondering, my gosh, if i may love my bills, will they get to the destination they need to get . If i mail out my bills . I was talking to a postal worker and she told it would be ok because they went on the reverse of what they previously said, that they wont make changes until after the election. So that part is good. But i am confident in the post office. I pay my bills through the post office. I am old school with that. Sick and he was getting medications through the v. A. , and they would come the next day or within seven days if they would say. And that has been a really important since he has gone to heaven. And the sorting machines the post office had improved with getting the mail. You would get your mail within a day or two. So dismantling those machines is disgusting. That is my money. Those machines were paid for by our money. Like i said, i am very proud of them and they work very hard. Thank you. Host lets go to michelle who is calling from decatur, illinois. Good morning. Caller good morning. How are you today . Host just fine. Caller thank you for taking my call. I do have confidence in the Postal Service, what i dont have confidence in is our leadership. I have never in my 66 years seen a leader of our country tried to us so the seeds of doubt for thele to vote try to sow seeds of doubt for people to vote. Get out there and vote, people. Its important. Host than us is his calling from greenfield, massachusetts. Good good morning. Caller good morning, jesse. I hope you are doing great. You guys rock. I do not have confidence in it, and it is not because of three mailboxes rate it is because i live in greenfield. I get somebodys mail that has the same house number as mine on greenfield road in leiden. Greenfield,es from leiden road, and it turns into leiden road, greenfield. We have the same zip code, and if it is a male sorting machine mail sorting machine, they have the wrong town. They have them backwards. We put the letters into the mailbox and lo and behold, three days later, get the same letter back. Our letter carrier is not a postal worker. She is a subcontractor because they do not want to pay for her health insurance. So, give me a break. It is not a fact that i do not trust the carriers, i do not trust the sorting machines. Host lets go to iran, calling from troy, montana. Good morning lets go to ron, coming from troy, montana. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I have full trust in the post office. Was a postmaster at side of jacksonville, florida. Old, itpost office is is broke. It means to be fixed and privatized. Which he also worked at the post office and was in upper management, would go to the post office at night, sit down and talk with people and collect over time. Now, to me, that is a waste of money, to be paying someone to talk to somebody and it is over time. The big thing is, now that it is an election, you cannot just all of a sudden mail out a bunch of ballots to people and expect this thing to be perfect. It is not going to be. Area. In a very rural i have trouble getting my medicine. I am a disabled vet also, but i due to mytee ballots health sent out to my house. This is the first year that within my absentee ballots, and we have a democrat governor, i get a thing that i can turn my ballot over to whoever i want to handle it. For the first time in seven or eight years that i have seen anything like that in the mail. Since then, we have gotten thing sent to us from companies, which there is nothing you can do, h applications for my dog host we would like to thank all of our callers and viewers for calling into for that segment. Coming up, two perspectives on the u. S. Postal service on legislation before congress. John cy vance will join us next, followed by representative fred keller of pennsylvania. We will be right back. On q a,y night catherine gale with her book the politics industry. The money that we see, the gridlock that we see is a result few who are incentive to work far apart from each other and are incentive to keep everybody else out, and they are incentive not to compromised ever because it works better for them to leave a problem unsolved than to little on and give a either side. They would rather leave the problem unsolved and keep it as an issue for the next election. Catherine gail, sunday night at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspans q a. Washington journal continues. Byt we are joined democratic representative John Sarbanesoxley maryland, a member of the house sorry veins of ireland, a member of the house John Sarbanes, a member of the House Oversight committee. He will talk about the upcoming hearing and legislation in front of the house today. Good morning. Guest good morning. It is great to be here. Host first, i would like to know what you thought about fridays hearing in the senate with postmaster general louis dejoy. Did you learn something you did not know . What was your reaction to what he said . Guest well, i still have concerns based on the testimony he gave that we do not have the full story. I think he needs to be even more transparent. I would like to know how decisions were made regarding what the procedures and policies have and since he came in and get more insight into that. He seems reluctant to give us that complete picture. He is providing some assurances, but nothing that is iron clad. Nothing super specific. It is important to move ahead and process this and see what they particularly are through this pandemic that we are facing because if there was ever a time when we want to make sure that the post office is strong and being able to meet the needs of the public out there, it would be in this moment when people are so reliant on the mail given the pandemic and their expectations of how theyre going to be able to vote this fall. Dot what specific issues you want postmaster general dejoy to address on monday . What specific questions do you need to hear answers to . Guest first of all, jesse, i will share my experience with the office because i think what we are seeing in my office as a member of congress, republicans and democrats, have been seeing that across the country, that really over the last four weeks to six weeks, the challenges with delivery of mail have increased exponentially, and let me give you numbers from my own office. From the whole 2019 calendar year, we had 11 cases of people expressing concerns about delivery of their male, delays and other issues, so that was 11 cases in 2019. This20, so far, just up to point, we have had 106 cases, almost 10 times as much, and 103 has happened since the week of july 26. In other words, over the last month or so. So something is going wrong here. We think it is a combination of factors. He has issued directives which we would like to see him pull back to these postal carriers to go out, leave on their routes before they have all the mail in their bag, which does not make any sense because that means customers are not getting the mail that they are expecting to get, often times or they have gotten electronic notice that that mail is coming to them. He has eliminated the use of some over time, which would allow the different handoffs through the personal service to happen. Let me give you an example of what i mean because a lot of people are not really focused on this. If a truck leaves from a central processing facility with mail and it heads to original facility and it breaks down for an hour and needs to be repaired, that might force their driver into an overtime situation. If the driver has been told you cannot access the overtime to complete that delivery so that interim processing facility, the driver has to go back to the original facility and take the mail back to that facility, so that handoff doesnt happen. That is why the use of overtime is critical to get the mail where it needs to go, but he has put these new restrictions in place, so basically what we want to see, jesse, is go back to the standards of service and delivery that were in place as of january this year. Keep those in place through the election, and past the pandemic, and then at that point, lets have a conversation about where changes, upgrades and other things can make the Postal Service as strong as it can be and where those things need to happen. But to make all these disruptive changes in the middle of a pandemic and on the eve of of an election, where we know tens of millions of americans are going to went over by mail, that doesnt make sense to me. Host a lot of these changes that the postmaster general is making, they had already been planned by the Postal Service. He just started implementing them in july. What do you want to see done . Do you want him to go back and rethink all of those from the beginning or just delay until 2021 . Guest i think it is a combination of just thinking through how you implement these changes at any time. But for sure, lets postpone any major change in a moment where we need the Postal Service and the postal carriers in the workforce over there to be able to carry out their jobs under intense pressure. I mean, there are hundreds and hundreds, jesse, of postal workers who have sidelined by the coronavirus pandemic. Service ispostal already operating under extreme conditions because of the pandemic. Whichs not the moment at you force major changes onto the Postal Service. We know that in this moment, we need to step back, keep the policies and practice and standards in place that existed back in january. That is what our bill says. And then when we get through this difficult moment, lets look at what the proposed upgrades and restructurings are that frankly and the committee that i am part of, the oversight committee, we have been talking about that for a couple of years now, and think about how you can insensibly put these things in place. But do not cause a lot of disruption in this moment. And to be honest, some of the things he is doing go beyond proposed changes that were in place from before. In a much moree aggressive, and in my view, haphazard way that we would like to see. That is part of what we will be asking the postmaster general this coming monday. Host we will remind our viewers that they can take part in the conversation. We will open up our regular lines. Republicans, your line is 202 7488001. Democrats, your line is 202 7488000. Independents, you can call 202 7488002. Day, postale all workers, we still want to hear from you. Your number is 202 7488003. You can also text as at that same number 202 7488003. Reading on social media on twitter at cspanwj and on facebook at facebook. Com cspan. Representative sergey, the house sarbanes, the house will go into session in less than one hour and they will bring up the house delivery for america act. Tell us what that builders. Guest tell us what that bill does. Guest this is our response to the situation. It is straightforward. Wouldand foremost, it prohibit the kinds of changes we have seen being put in place and asked the postmaster general were not ask him but direct him to pull back on those changes, maintain the same standards around delivery and the operations of the Postal Service that were in place as of january of this year, and to keep those standards in place through the thetion and through recovery from this pandemic whenever that might be, which, as i say, is just recognizing we are in a very, very difficult situation right now. This is not the time to be making a lot of disruptive changes. It would direct the postmaster general to pull back these changes and go back to the original standards in place. Thatdly, it would require ballots be treated as first class mail. In other words, we know that tens of millions of americans are going to use the Postal Service this year to cast their ballot in the election, and they are doing that in order to keep safe in the middle of a pandemic. We want that mail to be treated as first class. It has been a tradition of the Postal Service to do that in the past, to treat ballots as first class mail, but we want to make sure there is no wiggle room here and that is how it is handled. Why . So people can have confidence that when they mail that ballots back, it is going to get to the right place in time to be counted for the election. Is toird major thing provide 25 billion in funding to help support the Postal Service at this critical moment. U. S. L point out that the Postal Service board of governors, all of whom are appointed by President Trump, this was their recommendation, the 25 billion was there ask, so we want to meet that in order to provide that support for the Postal Service. So there are some other things in there, but those are three key points. As you say, we will vote on that in the house of representatives within the next couple of hours. Host we want to remind our viewers that you can see the house in session at 10 00 a. M. Here on cspan. Lets go to our phone calls and see who is calling. Lets start with doug, calling from burnett, wisconsin, on the republican line. Good morning. Guest good caller good morning. I think these are two separate issues. The ability of the post office does not secure my ballot. What is to stop me from purchasing my childrens ballots, having them sign it and then fill in the blanks . That i amthing to worried about is it was not too long ago when we had the anthrax scare and enclosed on the post offices. Who is to say a foreign entity is not going to do Something Like this . NotPostal Office does secure my ballot. It is just kind of ridiculous. Host go ahead and respond. Guest thanks, doug for the question. There are not a lot of issues at play here. First of all, i would say that using the Postal Service to vote and to vote by mail and send your ballot in by mail is a tried and true situation. People have been doing that for many, many years, and they have been doing it in a way where the integrity of that vote is protected and there is a lot of verification procedures in terms of when the ballot comes through the mail and to Election Officials so that we can make sure that vote is accurate. The difference this year is there are going to be a lot more people who want to use that opportunity, and that is why i think we want to make sure the a strongrvice is in position over the next few months because they will have a lot of mailin ballots to handle, and we want to make sure they do that well. That is why we need the funding and cannot have disruptive changes in place because we want to get that job done well. Youd want to point out, mentioned foreign interference, and, obviously, we are trying to protect our elections broadly against meddling and interference from foreign actors. We have a lot of protections in place to do that. Makeis why it does not sense for our own postmaster general to be so disruptive to the Postal Service at a time when we need everything to be in place and strong. So lets make sure our Postal Service is working well and has that strength and support to increase our confidence that nobody can interfere with our elections. , callings go to jb from hot springs, national arc Hot Springs National park in arkansas on the democratic line. Caller good morning. Correct in, am i saying that amazon did not pay any taxes last year is to mark guest i think that is last year . Guest i think that is right. A lot of these huge corporations are getting away with not paying what i regard as their fair share. Host thats good edward, calling from richmond, kentucky. Edward, good morning. Caller good morning, how are you . Host just fine, go ahead, edward. Three ok, i am from generations of postal carriers that were for the post office department. Quite blankly, by removing these extra sorters as we have, you actually are slowing down the mail and by not using more transport and circulating your mail from sections to your areas, you are definitely slowing the mail as it goes. Mail, youfirst class have to have those disorders to sort the mail to get them to go to their destination, but at the have a drop in your employees, and you do not have the overtime, so those employees are not able to sort the mail the way they should be, delays, whicht on slows down the mail completely. Edward, first of all, thank you to the commitment of your family to the post office over the last three generations. Actually, that points to what i think is one of the most of thisg components whole conversation around the Postal Service, which is the real dedication and the people who work there. We have heard from a number of Union Representatives who are talking about how anguished the postal workers on the front line are because, jesse, if you think about it, their whole mission, their whole commitment is this idea to get the mail delivered to people without delay. That is what keeps the morale of the postal workers up if they fulfill that Mission Every single day, so when these changes are imposed on the that are so disruptive and basically force them to go on their routes without having all the mail and thereby, it cuts against their very nature. This is really tough for these postal workers on the front lines. They have these strong bonds and relationships with the customers that they serve. They want to meet that and continue to have that trusted relationship. That 90 emarkable is of americans have a positive opinion of the Postal Service. That shows the real bond of trust that has been else between the Postal Service and the seeic, and what i hate to is the changes that have come down over the last couple of months have really undermined that bond between the Postal Service and the public, and it is workers on the front lines who are most upset about that because they want to do their job. They want to deliver that meal. Unfortunately, the postmaster general has put in place some practices over the last couple of month that are going right at that and upsetting that relationship. To be honest, that is one of the number one reasons we are pushing back. We want people to be able to trust the post office to know that there mail is going to come. We have veterans who rely on the mail for prescription medicines. We have seniors who rely on males for Social Security checks and others are getting stimulus checks and Unemployment Benefits through the mail. The mail. Nesses need the post office is something the mental to the way of life in our country, and we need to keep it strong. Host congressman, i know the house will be voting on the bill for the u. S. Postal service, but some house members are also asking for a vote this weekend on Unemployment Insurance, which Speaker Nancy Pelosi has rejected. Is that the right move or does that vote need to happen this weekend, as well . Guest i certainly understand that people want to get those Unemployment Insurance benefits extended, and nancy pelosi is not rejecting that proposal. She wants to make it part of the larger relief package that, frankly, we passed in the house we months ago and has been sitting on the senate side because Mitch Mcconnell did not take it. Is oneyment insurance vertical component of that larger package. Additionalt to see stimulus checks going out to americans, additional help for small businesses. Absolutely support our state and local governments, which are very much living on the edge because of the lost revenue during this pandemic, getting hazard pay to frontline workers, so we absolutely support extending strong Unemployment Insurance benefits, but there are a lot of other key components to making sure that relief is in place and assistance for americans across the country, and that is why we need to get the entire heroes pack which and something or something negotiated in good faith, we need to get that pass to get released to americans across the country. Host lets see if we can get a few more callers. Lets start with robert, calling from greenville, North Carolina, on the independent line. Good morning. Caller good morning. Host go ahead, robert. Caller all right. We do not get if we do not get the sorting machines back, there is no way we are going to be able to handle this election. Allar as donald trump and the people involved and everything, we need to get it right because there is not going to be a do over. Donald trump is the worst thing to happen to this country. People have to understand, if he 10s, we are not going to get years from now. He is destroying everything. It is despicable. And listen to the lying people around him. They are all grifters. We know. You know it. We need to do something about it and get our act together because we are letting this more on this moron take over our government. Host go ahead and respond. Guest let me talk, robert, about the sorting issues because i think you are right. These are critical pieces of equipment that process thousands and thousands of pieces of mail, including what will be the ballots that come through the Postal Service. Our. Ands of pieces in they are critical thousands of pieces each hour. They are critical and ready to go in the back of the letter carrier when they leave on their routes to deliver to customers. The postmaster said, well, volume of mail has decreased from where it used to be traditionally. That is why we are pulling these machines out. Overhad plans to pull out 1600 processing machines. In baltimore, they pulled four out of the main office and another two or three from offices around the state of maryland. If you know that you are going to have a lot of ballots coming, tens of millions of ballots that are going to be coming through the Postal Service between now and november 3, it is crazy to pull these processing machines out of service at that particular moment. Lets have the discussion about whether we need to come up with a better number of processing machines after we get through the election and after we get through the pandemic, but why you would dismantle them now does not make any sense to me. It seems kind of crazy. So we have got to get those back online so we are ready. First of all, we have to stop them from pulling any more process machines offline. Then we have to try and restore some of them to be as ready as possible to handle what is going to be a very, very large influx of mailin ballots because people want to use the Postal Service. Host lets go to donna, calling from york, maine, on the democratic line. Morning. Caller good morning. Thank you. I have two points. One is a question. The distinction between , iversal mailin ballots think they are doing that to registered voters and mailing of applications of absentee ballots, which i think is a safer approach, and i do not want to give trump any excuse to complain about this election. I am afraid that mailing the ballots themselves that have not been requested is an open ending. The second question is, why in 2006 was the post office required to Fund Pensions for 75 years . Who does that, and what was the defense of that position . Thanks. Guest donna, Great Questions and great points. On the pension funding, it is a very unusual formula posed on the Postal Service and something that in the broad, comprehensive reform of the Postal Service we have been working on for the past couple of years we would address that. Sense for theke Postal Service staff labor under these unique requirements under the pension when no other organizations are required to do that. When it comes to your point on universal mail, you are right. There is this idea of mailing a ballot out to every registered voter versus an application and then people return the application for the ballot. I think in both instances, we can be confident there are verification procedures in place to make sure the person who is voting is the person they are supposed to be, and if that vote is tallied, i have confidence there. I want to make another point to the extent you have a lot of states, and maryland is one, that is first going to mail out millions of applications for ballots to people who then have the option to return them. Then the ballot goes to them. All that is doing is increasing the volume for the postal havece because you millions of ballot applications being mailed through the post maryland youin have hundreds of thousands of people mailing the back through the Postal Service, and then the ballot will go out to those people and then it will come back, so that is four transactions that are relying on the Postal Service to make sure it is done properly. Again, it does not make any sense to undercut the capacity of the Postal Service at a moment when it is going to face that unprecedented pressure in terms of the election. That is one of the key reasons we want to make sure the Postal Service stays strong. Host we would like to thank representative John Sarbanes of maryland, a member of the oversight and Reform Committee, that will be questioning postmaster general louis dejoy on monday. Congressman, thank you for being with us. Guest thank you, jesse. Have a good day. Host coming up, we continue our discussions on the Postal Service and legislation to provide additional funding would fred keller of pennsylvania with fred keller of pennsylvania. We will be right back. Binge watch books tv saturday evenings at 8 00 eastern. Several in and watch several hours of your settle in and watch for several hours. Tonight, robert caro, whose books include the powerbroker, and the biography of president lyndon johnson. We will feature programs of the late christopher hitchens. Ge watch tv on cspan2 binge watch booktv on cspan2. American history tv on cspan3, exploring the people and events that tell the american story every weekend. This weekend, tonight at 10 00 eastern on reel america, 75 years ago, august 15, 1945, the end of world war ii pup. We will feature three films on the state of affairs after the war. Here isdemocracy, germany, and on sunday at 6 00 p. M. Eastern on american artifacts, a twopart program on africanamericans in congress. U. S. House of representatives historian and a house. Her use a reflection of artifacts to tell the history of africanamericans in congress. A look at past Political Convention acceptance speeches by president ial nominees, including bill clinton and george w. Bush. Exploring the american story. Watch American History tv this weekend on cspan3. Next week, it is the republicans turn. Starting monday and for four days, the Republican National convention. Hear their vision for the future and priorities the next four years. Watch President Trump Vice President pence except their partys nomination for reelection. Live coverage begins monday at 9 00 p. M. East 9 00 a. M. Eastern. And then the evening session takes off. Watch live on cspan, Live Streaming and ondemand at cspan. Org, or listen with the free cspan radio app. Before the conventions evening session, watch cspan at 6 00 p. M. Eastern for past speeches by prominent republican politicians, like former secretary of state colonel powell and condoleezza rice. Watch past Convention Speeches and the start of the Republican National convention monday only on cspan, your unfiltered view of politics. Washington journal continues. Host we are back with congressman frank keller, republican of pennsylvania, also on the oversight and Reform Committee in the house who will question louis dejoy on monday. Good morning. Guest good morning morning, how are you . Host i am doing great. The house will going to session in 30 minutes with the demo rats bill delivering for america act on the floor. Ill deliveringb for america act on the floor. What do you think about it . Guest the first thing i wanted to say is they are trying to name it delivering for america act, but what we need to be concerned with are the people who deliver our mail and the millions who rely on a countable delivery of the mail. Bill doesats absolutely nothing to ensure that it is sustainable longterm. The Postal Service over the last 13 years has lost 78 billion. We have repeatedly asked for plans on what theyre going to do for longterm sustainability. The Postal Service, as they have said themselves, has enough money to operate through august of next year. What we should be looking at doing is looking at what our longterm plan is and making sure that for the sake of the people who process and deliver our mail and work hard every day and the people who depend on the mail, that they have a sustainable, longterm plan. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing we did today as yesterday and expecting a different result. This is what we are doing. It is saying you cannot make any reforms until after january 1 of next year at the earliest. Lets take a look at this. About makingcared sure there is reliable service, we would be taking the steps to understand what needs to be done rather than voting on a piece of legislation. We are going to be voting today on a bill for the Postal Service. Yet, the speaker and chairwoman maloney scheduled an oversight hearing for monday. I think that is backwards. I think the people of america look at this and see this, too. I am going to vote no today because it doesnt hit the goal of taking sure the workers, the retired postal employees and American People are treated fairly. Host the postmaster general was in front of a Senate Committee on friday. What was your reaction to not only what he said that the questions he faced coming from democrats and republican senators . Guest i would like the opportunity to see him come before the House Committee because i have questions we would like to make sure we understand going forward. Generalt the postmaster answer the questions and so on, but we still do not have the longterm plan for the Postal Service. If you look at what anybody would do, and if you are a business looking for additional money and you go to the Lending Facility to do it, they will require a plan before they put more money into it. I would see it more urgent Postal Service did not have resources to get through next august, but since they do, i think it is incumbent upon congress to make sure we do it properly so that the hardworking people of america, the hardworking postal workers, have that dependability longterm. What we are doing today is not hitting that mark. Host what is the specific question you want the post Office General to answer before he comes before the House Oversight committee . What answers do you want from him . Guest i would like to see where they are with their postemployment benefits because making sure people who worked for the post office and are retired, make sure they have the benefits they were promised. So what is the plan for that and where does the post office stand because they have not been funding that. That is a concern. The other concern is what is their plan to make sure as far as revenue packages, we have seen a decline in mail over the past years because of the use of technology and more people are using electronic communications. What is their plan for the delivery of the mail to make sure they have a sustainable model . How much mail how they processed and what are their plans . People work hard for the Postal Service and theyre working a lot of overtime. What is the plan to make sure we can deliver the mail on time and not require our workers to work such the amount of overtime they are working . Those are some of the rings think we need to address as we move forward with the Postal Service. Host let me take a second to remind our viewers that they can join the conversation. We will open up our regular lines. Republicans, your line is 202 7488001. Democrats, you can call 202 7488000. Independents, we want to hear from you at 202 7488002. Workers, wepostal want to know what you are thinking. Your number is going to be 202 7488003. You can always text us at 202 7488003. We are always reading on social media on twitter at, cspanwj, and on facebook at facebook. Com cspan. Membersman keller, as a of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, you and other Committee Republicans have been calling for that Long Term Plan you were just talking about. You sent a letter and i will read a little bit of it to our viewers please produce the usps 10 year Business Plan and reforms to improve the Postal Service Business Model and operating conditions. The need for a longterm plan is clear. Providing billions will only delay insolvency and not eliminated. Providing a Business Plan allows congress to engage in meaningful path forward for usps. Usps provides a Central Service to every community in the nation, and we need serious, longterm reforms, to equip our postal workers to continue delivering the mail. Congressman, when do you need to see this plan and what are you going to make sure the post Office Actually delivers it . Guest we are going to do everything we can in congress to hold them accountable to deliver that. I think the postmaster that has been recently appointed once to head in that direction, or at least i hope he does. Question i would ask, what is your timeframe to have that plant together so congress can reveal it . So congress can review it . That is what we need to do. I certainly do not want the that deliverpeople and process the mail to be caught in the middle of any discussion or disagreement between congress and the Postal Service. It should not happen. If everybody cares about those employees, and we will sit down and have those discussions. I do not know how long it will take to put that plan together but lets see what he thinks the timeframe will be and if it doesnt happen soon enough, then we can have that discussion if you cannot have it done within a certain amount of time, but he has been there for a couple of months and i think he should have already started to work on that plan. Lets see what we have. Would see itwe sooner rather than later and let us be able to get down to the work of what does the plan look like and if we approve of the plan, how do we give them the tools to executed . Host we have heard some argument this morning from callers and other guests that say the pandemic has really severely hurt the Postal Service. With the pandemic and everything happening, should they need immediate funding to keep the Service Going as it is . Especially with more people expected to use mailin ballots in the fall . Guest if you look at the post offices own information, early on, revenues were down. May andr in april or june, they saw an increase in revenue over the previous years because of handling more packages and because of ecommerce and people getting things delivered to their homes and their buying patterns changing. The financial state of the post office as far as revenue coming in seems to have increased over prior year. Initially, that might have been the case, but when you look at the last quarter, they have seen and in crease. At that, is looking but the other part of your question is, what do we need to look at doing or do they have enough money to keep going . They have 14 billion currently. They have access to another 10 billion through treasury, set up with the cares act, so they have estimates tor own be solvent to august of 2021. That is why what we are doing it isnot something something that needs to happen in between on a saturday. I mean, if this was such an issue, they should have taken care of it before now. But we have the postmaster general appointed here a couple of months ago, and lets see what his plan is, and upon agreement with what he has planned, lets see what he can do to help Postal Service be able to continue its commission. Host lets let some of our viewers take part. Lucy, callingwith from pennsylvania on the republican line. Good morning. Caller good morning. My biggest problem is not whether it gets delivered not. My problem is when you go to a voting machine, people are not supposed to know how you will vote. It is supposed to be a personal thing. This way, they are sending them back and people know. I have heard that they even have on the form if it is democratic or republican. That just makes it so that the ones who want to cheat, you are just giving it to them in their hands. Back in 2016, when i went to pick up signs for trump, i had therethe person who was and i was told there was either 17,000 to 18,000 votes that were in philadelphia alone that should not have been there. I asked her if that was true. She said, yes. I said, well, do they count the votes . She said, yes. That isnt right. And that is only one city. Now they are sending these forms back and people are allowed to do whatever they want to do . For years, people have not gone to the voting places at all because of the fact they do not believe it makes any difference whether they vote or not because they know there is so much cheating going on. Thathen the simple fact they trying to undo should not be undoing the machines but improving the. Right now to knology is everything. Now they should be able to put something in there to help the post office to the mail. Four different times somebody elses mail that does not have anything to do with my address. Host go ahead and respond. Guest thank you for the question. A couple of things i would look ,t their, during the primary the ballot that somebody receives, in pennsylvania, a ghost to the party they are registered to vote for. Even when you go to register for a vote for a primary, you are selecting your nominee for that office, so they will ask you whether you get the republican or Democrat Ballot because the democrat voters vote for their partys candidates to nominate somebody for that office and republicans vote for that. You would see at a primary election of ballot that would have different names based on your voter registration, so that is why you would see that on the form coming to you in a primary election. In a general election, there would no identification as far as an r or d on the ballot because it is the republican, democrat or independent candidates facing out against one another for that office, so for one thing, i would say when the ballot comes to the courthouse, it is actually the board of elections responsibility to handle that valid and it has an identification on it that once it has been identified, the ballot is removed from that and put it with the other ballots so you do not know how you voted in that election, but they know youre ballot was received by the board of elections, so i think the system of the Postal Service being able to deliver the balance or deliver them to the person who casted and deliver the ballot back to the elections office, i think it works. The problem we have is when people mail ballots that did not request them. That is the issue. Pennsylvania has absentee balloting, which we have done for a lot of years, and that is when a voter takes an action to fill out an application and sends it to the Registration Office that says, i will be out of town or unable to vote because i am sick or whatever happens, and now the General Assembly passed it and there is no excuse. So you actually take the action to request the ballot and then the ballot is sent to you, you fill it out and send it back. That valid on a general election informationo because it is the same, but it is different because we nominate candidates for each party. I think Postal Service can handle that valid very well. The problem we have with this is when the governor, and governors of other states, went to wholesale mail ballots to people that were registered to vote, i represent a district with a lot of College Students. A College Student we have voted two years ago when they were a junior. Now they moved and the voter rolls were not purged and everybody gets and the governor would assume everyone gets the mailin ballot. What happens to the extra ballots no one requested . Guys the question of the secure election. Ballots, and again, i do not have a problem with the post office handling them. I think they can handle that. It is making sure that what happens in person, and it pulling places we have heard stories about in certain parts of the country, so it is a matter of inking sure every vote is secure. That can be done if it is the action of the voter to us that ballot and not just mail them out randomly. As far as the mail sorting machines, i know some have been decommissioned or moved to different parts of the country. Mail volume is down, so you do not need to necessarily keep the machines in the same locations. You may not receive or deliver as much mail to a certain area of the country, so one of those machines may need to be moved or maybe do not need the machine. It is taking up space in the mailroom because you do not have the volume or things got more efficient. So there are a lot of eggs, but all of that should be part of the plan and when they look at putting the plan together, they say, this is what we are going to do to align our service with the products or process we have delivered, so i would say that the concern with voting should be we are not just mailin ballots. It means to be an action taken by the voter to request that valid to vote by mail. Host thats going to gary, calling from colorado springs, colorado. Gary has worked with the Postal Service. Good morning. Caller good morning, jesse. Thank you for taking my call. I would like to ask the that heman on this plan is going to try to get the postmaster general, i think the biggest priority on the new plan of future plan is to get rid that issue put into law by george bush back in 2006 to a futurefor 75 years and current postal Retirees Health benefits. That normally run 70 billion a year, and that is the reason why the post office has never made any money because all that money is supposed to be going into the retirees. The post office is the only federal agency that has to do that. There is no other federal Government Agency in the u. S. That has to do prefunding. Understand like six months or seven months ago, the house passed a bill to get rid of that funding and it is stalling in the senate. I know he does not have control over with the senate does, but i think that is a big reason why the post office isnt making money. Not because of what we hear that we are not charging amazon or whatever companies for us to deliver their packages, so i would like to see the congressman on monday asked the postmaster general, will the postmaster general come on board to request that this defunding of the retirees go into effect . Guest gary, thank you for the question. The first point i would like to make, and we are looking at the issue of what you are calling prefunding. We went to make sure everybody understands what is happening there. I want to have the postmaster general once and for all, are we talking about funding for employees hired today and our current employees . So when we hire a new employee and when that person is put on the payroll, we are paying as we go to make sure that when that person retires, there is an adequate amount of money to fund postemployment benefits. If that is what we are doing, we need to continue to do that and that is in prefunding but paying as you go because you cannot hire employees and have them go to work every day expecting a benefit and then not having any money put back. That is what i want to make sure the post Office Master the postmaster general clears up because i would think that is reasonable. Work,like if people go to for a private employer or not, if they put money in Social Security, they do not wait until they retire. They put it in as they work so the benefit is there. So we can call it prefunding are whatever, but we need to get down to the bottom and that whether it is refunding or paying as you go for an employee currently working for the post Office Rather than waiting until they retire, and if you are a retired postal employee or someone working for the post office, i think you would want to understand that, too, and make sure after you have done the hard work for the people in this country delivering mail, then you would make sure the benefit is there for you when you retire, so that would be part of what we look into and it should be part of any plan. Host lets go to pete, calling from pennsylvania. Pete has also worked for the Postal Service. Caller good morning. I am talking about in regards to and if youget mail look in the upper righthand corner, where the postal stamp is, it will say nine or 11 cents for a lot of letters. This is revenue that the post office is really down on. This is approved by the socalled board of governors. I paid 50cents for a firstclass stamp, and im not complaining, but nine cents or 11cents for businesses or charities, that is one spot where the post office could charge maybe 25 cents or 30 cents, and billions of advertisements and things like that, could pick up some of the revenue needed for the post office. Guest thank you for asking that question thank you for asking that question. The plan should make sure they understand the call. If the Postal Office understands the cost, they can say, this is what we need to have to provide this service. Or 55 cents, cents whenever the forms were done in 2007, long before i was in congress, and that is why i have been in congress for a little while and digging into these issues, im not going to wait for 10 years or 15 years to look at this stuff. I am looking at it now, but to make sure they understand the cost. Back then, the post office at this is what they should charge for a stamp. There should not be an arbitrary number that anybody pulls out of the air and says that should be but lookof the stamp at this is what we need to do to paper fixed cost and play for theiree wages and pay for Retirement Benefits if we provide those, and the Postal Service does. That is part of the plan to make sure things are costed properly to make sure people who work the post office and who work hard every day and the people who have retired and the people who depend on delivery habit for generations to come have it for generations to come. Host before we have to let congressman keller go, i would like to ask quickly, the Republican National Convention Starts on monday. What are you looking forward to at the rnc and what do you need to hear from President Trump . You can see the Republican National Convention Live on cspan starting at 9 00 a. M. Eastern. What do you need to hear at the rnc this year . Guest i watched what happened convention and i heard the former Vice President mention what is on the ballot. I believe what is on the ballot this time our promises and results. President trump has delivered on both of those areas in a short amount of time, so i looked to the president to be able to say, this is what we have done. Americans elected President Trump because they did not want career politicians who had been in washington, d. C. , for almost half a century and what was referred to as a swamp. They wanted someone looking at it differently that had that experience outside of government. That is what is on the ballot. Status have 50 years of quo in washington, d. C. , or the last 3. 5 years of results and promises kept by donald trump and that is the difference. Host we would like to thank congressman fred keller from pennsylvania for being with us today. Thank you. Guest thank you. I appreciate the opportunity. Host and i think all of you for being with us for the show today. Coming up, a live recording of the house of representatives. Have a great day, everyone. The speaker pro tempore the house will be in order. The chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. The clerk the speakers rooms, washington, d. C. August 22, 2020. I hereby appoint the honorable brenda l. Lawrence to act as speaker pro tempore on this day. Signed, nancy pelosi, speaker of the house of representatives. The speaker pro tempore the prayer will be offered by our chaplain, father conroy. Chaplain conroy let us pray. God of us all, thank you for giving us another day. Bless the members of the le