Postal Service is committed to delivering Election Mail

Photo courtesy USPS Facebook

NORMAL, Ill.- The United States Postal Service is committed to fulfilling our role in the electoral process when public policy makers choose to utilize us as a part of their election system.

“We provide election officials who are mindful of our operational standards with a secure, efficient and effective means to enable citizens to participate in elections,” said USPS Strategic Communications Tim Norman. “We offer a powerful, national communications channel which enables candidates and interest groups to directly reach every home and business for the purpose of informing the public about the issues and policies at stake when they vote.”

In Central Illinois, across the state and nationally, the Postal Service is committed to delivering Election Mail in a timely manner.

“We employ a robust and proven process to ensure proper handling of all Election Mail, including ballots,” said Norman. “This includes close coordination and partnerships with election officials at the local and state levels. We recently posted a fact sheet to clear up some misinformation we were seeing.”

The Postal Service has more than enough capacity to handle election mail volume, according to Norman.

“The Postal Service is ready to handle whatever volume of election mail it receives,” said Norman.

Postmaster General DeJoy’s number one priority is to deliver election mail on-time and within the Postal Service’s well-established standards.

Effective Oct. 1, DeJoy will be committed to engage standby resources in all areas of Postal Service operations, including transportation, to satisfy any unforeseen demand.

The Postal Service delivers 433 million pieces of mail a day. Even if all Americans were to vote by mail this year, 330 million ballots over the course of the election would be only three-quarters of what the Postal Service delivers in one single day.

“The Postal Service has more than enough capacity, including collection boxes and processing equipment, to handle all election mail this year, which is predicted to amount to less than 2% of total mail volume from mid-September to Election Day,” said Norman.

Customers who opt to vote through the U.S. Mail must understand their local jurisdiction’s requirements for timely submission of mail-in ballots. In order to allow sufficient time for voters to receive, complete and return ballots via the mail, and to facilitate timely receipt of completed ballots by election officials, the Postal Service strongly recommends that jurisdictions immediately communicate and advise voters to request ballots at the earliest point allowable but no later than 15 days prior to Election Day.

The Postal Service further recommends that domestic, non-military voters mail their ballots at least one week prior to Election Day to allow for timely receipt by election officials.

The Postal Service also recommends that voters contact their local election officials for information about deadlines and other requirements.

At the same time, the Postal Service has updated their Election Mail website and posted an employee video on the site.

“The video is a statement from our Postmaster General and the leaders of our four largest unions of unity and the importance of fulfilling our civic duty and role in the upcoming election,” said Norman.