Postmaster general says ballots should be mailed in at least a week before Election Day

(CNN) — Postmaster General Louis DeJoy pledged Thursday that the US Postal Service will undertake “heroic efforts” to deliver all mail-in ballots on time this year and urged people to put their ballots in the mail at least one week before Election Day on November 5.

“Let me be clear, the Postal Service is ready to deliver the nation’s mail-in ballots,” DeJoy said at a news conference, held as a bipartisan group of election officials recently raised concerns about the delivery of mail ballots and former President Donald Trump repeats some of his debunked false claims about supposed fraud with mail-in voting.

“We encourage the voting public to mail early if they chose to vote by mail,” he said.

USPS will work “around the clock” and implement “extraordinary measures” to ensure the timely delivery of mail-in voting, DeJoy said. A record 43% of voters cast mail ballots in 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic. The level isn’t expected to be as high this year, but many states across the country have expanded the availability of mail-in voting.

These special measures include designated lines at post offices for people with ballots, extra deliveries and collections by letter-carriers, “after-hours” drop-offs to election offices, and keeping processing facilities open on the Sunday before Election Day.

The postmaster general tiptoed around a question from CNN about Trump’s recent social media post, implicitly rebuking the former president without mentioning his name.

“My response is like my response to everyone who says we’re not prepared for the election – it is that they’re wrong,” DeJoy said. “I don’t know that I need to comment any more than that. They’re wrong.”

“For a variety of reasons, there is a heightened sensitivity and scrutiny across the entire vote-by-mail ecosystem,” DeJoy also said. “…The American public will become increasingly alarmed if there is ongoing dialogue that continues to question the reliability of the Postal Service for the upcoming elections.”

Lying about mail-in voting was a centerpiece of Trump’s 2020 campaign, and as the 2024 race reaches the final stretch, he has resurrected many of these false claims.

In a social media post on Sunday, Trump claimed without evidence that USPS “admitted that it is a poorly run mess.” And Trump claimed in a recent interview with a right-wing radio host that USPS will “lose hundreds of thousands of ballots, maybe purposely.”

Despite Trump’s claims, voter fraud is extremely rare in US elections, according to studies from liberal and conservative groups, and the expansion of mail-in voting doesn’t automatically benefit Democrats over Republicans. But since 2020, Trump’s incessant attacks on the practice has made it much less popular among GOP voters.

The USPS says during the 2020 election, which was conducted amid the Covid-19 pandemic, it delivered nearly 99% of ballots from voters to election officials within seven days. DeJoy has said “we take great pride” in how USPS handled the 2020 election, when there were major controversies and lawsuits regarding delivery of mail-in ballots.

DeJoy became postmaster general in June 2020 after being selected by the USPS Board of Governors. All six members of the bipartisan board were appointed by Trump.

Engaging with local officials

The National Association of Secretaries of State, an umbrella organization that represents election officials from both parties, started raising alarm bells earlier this month when it sent a letter to DeJoy expressing “ongoing concerns” about the postal service’s “ability to deliver election mail in a timely and accurate manner” this year.

Specifically, the election officials said they’ve experienced “exceptionally long delivery times” for election mail, including ballots, which could lead to those ballots getting rejected because they didn’t arrive before the deadline. They also wrote that they’ve noticed “higher than usual rates” of election-related mail being marked as undeliverable.

“Despite repeated engagement” with USPS officials who handle election mail, “we have not seen improvement or concerted efforts to remediate our concerns,” the letter said.

DeJoy said Thursday he is a “pretty accessible executive” and would step up coordination with the election officials during the final stretch of the campaign.

“I have agreed to stay more in contact with them,” DeJoy said, regarding the National Association of Secretaries of State. “I procedurally directed our regional team to be more integrated into meeting with our operational teams as we move forward, so we can more rapidly respond to issues as we get the specifics of those issues.”