Priority Mail

The beleaguered U.S. Postal Service needs a champion. Enter Joe Biden

- Amanda Kolson Hurley

George Washington believed mail service would play a key part in shaping the national consciousness. Woodrow Wilson’s administration pioneered airmail. Franklin Roosevelt thought of post offices as hallowed public spaces. He helped design six in upstate New York towns; you can still buy stamps at most of them.

Donald Trump, on the other hand, called the U.S. Postal Service “a joke,” vetoed billions of dollars in aid to the agency just as its employees were being ravaged by Covid-19, and falsely accused postal workers of seeking to corrupt the electoral process by selling mail-in ballots.

So you can imagine the relief among the rank and file at the USPS on Jan. 20, when Trump exited the White House and was replaced by Joe Biden. President Biden expressed admiration and support for the long-neglected USPS before the election and is likely to be its strongest supporter in decades. And if ever there was a federal agency in need of a champion, it’s the Postal Service, which suffered a net loss of $9 billion last year as it struggled with pandemic related absences and delivery delays, and faces the continuing threat of dwindling mail volume.