Postmaster General Louis DeJoy says he will suspend all operational changes to the post office until after the election

• Postmaster General Louis DeJoy announced on Tuesday that he would suspend all operational changes to Postal Service until after the election.
• DeJoy said that post office retail hours would not change, that mail-processing equipment and blue collection boxes would remain where they are, that no mail-processing facilities would close, and that overtime would continue being approved as needed.
• Changes to Postal Service operations designed to cut costs have delayed mail delivery in some parts of the country, sparking concerns that mail ballots may not be delivered in time for the November election.
• "To avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail, I am suspending these initiatives until after the election is concluded," DeJoy said in a statement.

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy announced on Tuesday that he would suspend all operational changes to the Postal Service until after the election.

In a statement, DeJoy said he wanted to "assure all Americans of the following":

• "Retail hours at Post Offices will not change."
• "Mail processing equipment and blue collection boxes will remain where they are."
• "No mail processing facilities will be closed."
• "And we reassert that overtime has, and will continue to be, approved as needed."

DeJoy added that beginning on October 1, the USPS would "engage standby resources in all areas of our operations, including transportation, to satisfy any unforeseen demand."

The postmaster general's announcement followed widespread backlash over changes to Postal Service operations, designed to cut costs, that delayed mail delivery in some parts of the country. Democrats had expressed concerns that the changes could delay the delivery of mail-in ballots in November.

Since becoming the postmaster general in June, DeJoy, a North Carolina shipping-and-logistics executive and Republican political donor, has announced plans to "implement an organizational realignment" and cost-cutting measures at the agency.

Over 20 states have sued the USPS over the operations changes, and DeJoy is set to testify before the Senate on Friday and the House on Monday.

Among the changes announced under DeJoy was a limit on overtime hours that would have reduced how much mail carriers could deliver in a day and resulted in undelivered mail being left in distribution centers, according to The Associated Press and The Washington Post.

DeJoy also drew sharp criticism for his decision to remove hundreds of high-volume mail-processing machines. Several states have seen letter-collection boxes removed, while people across the country have experienced major slowdowns in mail delivery.

President Donald Trump sought to distance himself from DeJoy over the weekend, telling reporters: "I don't know what he's doing. I can only tell you he's a very smart man."

"To avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail, I am suspending these initiatives until after the election is concluded," DeJoy said in his Tuesday statement.

That said, some of the changes — like removing sorting machines and collection boxes — have been underway for years, since before DeJoy took over as head of the USPS. Many were implemented in response to an overall decline in mail volume.

—Phil Mattingly (@Phil_Mattingly) August 18, 2020

The USPS, which has long been the target of lawmakers seeking to gut the agency, is suffering an unprecedented financial crunch during the coronavirus pandemic.

The sharp reduction in mail delivery caused by the pandemic threatened to plunge the agency into even more dire straits, with the Postal Service reporting a $2.2 billion quarterly net loss last week.

Trump, who has been hostile to the idea of expanding voting by mail, has opposed measures to prop up the embattled Postal Service. The Washington Post reported in April that he had refused to sign the Cares Act stimulus package if it included a bailout for the agency. And in an interview last week with Fox Business' Maria Bartiromo, he cited expanded mail-in voting as a reason he would reject emergency funding for the service in the next COVID-19 relief bill.

The president walked back his remarks that evening when CNN's Kaitlan Collins asked him whether he would veto any coronavirus relief bill that included funding for the USPS.

"No, not at all," Trump responded. "But one of the reasons the post office needs that much money is they have all these millions of ballots coming in from nowhere and nobody knows from where and where they're going."