PHOENIX (AP) - Arizona’s attorney general on Aug. 20 dismissed a criminal complaint filed by the state’s top election official accusing President Donald Trump of breaking election law by interfering with the U.S. Postal Service.
Trump doesn’t directly control the Postal Service, which is overseen by a board of governors appointed by the president and confirmed by the GOP-controlled Senate, Joe Kanefield, the top aide to Republican Attorney General Mark Brnovich, wrote.
Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs didn’t present any evidence of actual election interference in Arizona, Kanefield wrote. He also accused Hobbs of spreading misinformation about the election.
“In the midst of a pandemic and within months of a major election, it is critical that election officials not spread misinformation, politicize administrative processes, or criminalize congressional funding issues,” Kanefield wrote in a letter to Hobbs.
Hobbs last week asked Brnovich to investigate whether Trump’s criticism of the Postal Service, taken together with changes made by the new postmaster general, violated an Arizona law which makes it a crime to “knowingly delay the delivery of a ballot.”
“I’m disappointed to hear that Attorney General Brnovich is unwilling to even investigate,” Hobbs wrote on Twitter.
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Trump's recent statements on mail-in ballots
While President Trump casts his own ballots by mail, he has vigorously criticized efforts to allow more people to cast ballots by mail, which he argues without evidence will lead to increased voter fraud.
According to top election officials and research on the subject, incidents of voter fraud are “very, very low.”
“It’s infinitesimal. People have studied this. There’s been litigation over this. Commissions have been established on this,” said Commissioner Ellen L. Weintraub of the Federal Election Commission.
President Trump has also declared that he opposes additional funding for the USPS, acknowledging that his position would starve the agency of money Democrats say it needs to process an anticipated surge in mail-in ballots during the coronavirus pandemic.
Recent cost-cutting measures at USPS
According to the Associated Press, USPS' new leader, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a former supply-chain CEO and a major donor to President Donald Trump and other Republicans, has pushed cost-cutting measures to eliminate overtime pay and hold mail until the next day if postal distribution centers are running late.
Memos from post office leadership, obtained by The Associated Press, detailed an elimination of overtime and a halting of late delivery trips that are sometimes needed to make sure deliveries arrive on time. One document said if distribution centers are running behind, “they will keep the mail for the next day.” Another said: “One aspect of these changes that may be difficult for employees is that — temporarily — we may see mail left behind or mail on the workroom floor or docks.”
Additional records obtained by AP outline upcoming reductions of hours at post offices, including closures during lunch and on Saturdays. Rumors have also circulated about the potential for entire offices to shutter, after the Postal Service told Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., that regional managers there have identified 12 offices for “feasibility studies.” Postal employees have been recently instructed not to talk to news media while on duty, according to another memo obtained by AP.
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