ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø

Three more Democratic-led states announced they will take legal action to protect the U.S. Postal Service and mail-in voting as the Trump administration faces claims it is trying to undermine the election.

Backlash mounting, President Donald Trump’s embattled Postmaster General Louis DeJoy will appear Aug. 21 before the Senate to testify on mail delivery delays and service changes that lawmakers and others are warning could imperil the November election.

Rep. Peter DeFazio, chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives’ transportation panel, is among the elected officials calling on the head of the country’s Postal Service to step down.

A group of voters and candidates for office in New York sued President Donald Trump and Postmaster General Louis DeJoy to ensure enough funding and staffing so that absentee and mail-in ballots are counted the same as in-person ballots.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi is calling the House back into session over the crisis at the U.S. Postal Service, setting up a political showdown amid growing concerns that the Trump White House is trying to undermine the agency ahead of the election.

President Donald Trump raised a new obstacle in the completion of a deal on a coronavirus-relief package Aug. 13 by drawing a hard line against a Democratic plan for shoring up the U.S. Postal Service, adding his unsupported claim that more mail-in voting in the November election would increase fraud.

The U.S. Postal Service overhauled its organizational structure, as Democrats called for an investigation into whether the changes implemented by President Donald Trump’s postmaster general pose a threat to mail-in ballots for the November election.

The U.S. Postal Service says it lost $2.2 billion in the three months that ended in June as the beleaguered agency — hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic — piles up financial losses that officials warn could top $20 billion over two years.

House Democrats want to throw a financial lifeline to the struggling U.S. Postal Service amid concerns that mail delays could lead to hundreds of thousands of legitimate votes being thrown out, potentially skewing the election. Senate Republicans say the money isn’t needed.

Earlier this month, local letter carriers were told to delay delivering mail in order to save money for the United States Postal Service, a direction that apparently came from top federal officials to mail carriers throughout the country.