That dilemma stems from newly proposed USPS rules that seek to comply with an executive order President Donald Trump signed this spring to crack down on mail-in voting. If courts let the order stand, it would give the federal government an unprecedented role in elections — and could put even more voter data in the hands of Trump officials searching for supposed election fraud.
So what’s stopping states from sending ballots via ups or fedex? Like I know that’s more expensive but if democracy and privacy are at stake is this an option for the short term?
Ignoring legal hurdles like ballot harvesting, and ignoring that ballots must be postmarked to be considered valid—which means this whole situation would require the USPS, which is currently cooperating with the administration, to actually go behind their back and organize a system of postmarking then handing them off to a private company for delivery—it’s only possible if UPS or FedEx will accept them.
Will a giant private company accept a bunch of responsibility and do something altruistic that is also anti-Republican Party? Tune in to find out!
Postmarking no longer counts towards the deadline of things like tax returns, I am guessing voting as well.
Mail in ballots still require postmarks edit, unless you’re dropping them off by hand. That’s an incorrect guess and a misunderstanding of postmarks.
Your tax returns are considered timely if you hand them over to the USPS by the deadline. The postmark date was used as evidence to this point. The USPS clarified that postmarking wouldn’t be happening until your mail arrived at sorting facilities, so even if you technically dropped it in a blue box on the right date it may not get postmarked til later. That’s not really a change; obviously there are no little people employed to hide inside and stamp mail you drop in a hole. There’s also a last collection time written on all the boxes. However, distances between collection points and sorting facilities is increasing and transportation in some cases is getting less frequent. Also operations is less well staffed and the policy announcement is masking operational delays. As always if you want something stamped with the date you go to the window at a post office before they close.
It was at stake in 2024, people couldn’t give two shits then. Why would they now when more and more obstacles are being thrown in the way by the shitbags they allowed into power in the first place.