USPS will – In a Senate hearing on Wednesday, Postmaster General David Steiner said the U.S. Postal Service would not deliver mail-in ballots to states that do not provide a required “manifest” under a newly proposed rule tied to President Donald Trump’s push for more fed
A postal delivery question landed like a gavel in a Senate hearing on Wednesday: if a state refuses to turn over its absentee voter list, does the Postal Service still deliver the ballots.
When Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., asked Postmaster General David Steiner for a simple yes-or-no answer, the stakes were immediate—because the Postal Service, Steiner said, would need a specific set of information before it can mail ballots at all.
“Under our proposed regulation, no,” Steiner replied. “We would tell the state that we need the manifest.”
The answer came during Steiner’s testimony before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. Democrats used the moment to frame the proposal as an attempt to tighten federal control over elections through the mechanics of voting itself.
Steiner said the policy is routine and designed to ensure ballots are delivered “securely. efficiently. and accurately.” He also linked the approach to a broader effort to increase federal oversight of elections under President Donald Trump. who has been pushing for rules that bring more federal involvement into election operations.
The proposed rule would put the Postal Service in the center of what states must provide. Under the plan, states would need to provide the Postal Service with “the names, addresses and ballot barcode numbers for individuals to receive a mail-in ballot.”
Steiner described that list as less than what appears on a state voter roll. which can include voter registration data and other sensitive information. Still. the proposal would require states to hand over details specific enough to generate or verify the Postal Service’s ballot tracking—what Steiner called the “manifest.”.
“It really is trying to help the state make sure that the ballots that they send to the voters actually get there and get to those voters, and so it’s strictly a manifest for us to make sure that the right ballots are going to the right people,” Steiner said.
But Senate Democrats argued the requirement goes beyond general mail-handling and becomes election regulation by another route. Peters said the proposed policy is unconstitutional, calling it “another backdoor way of trying to influence this election.”
Peters pressed Steiner by asking again what would happen under the rule: if a state refuses to turn over its absentee voter list. the Postal Service would refuse delivery. Democrats framed that consequence as the kind of leverage that could reshape election administration without passing new voting laws.
Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., went further in describing what the policy fits into. She said the Postal Service is becoming part of a larger political effort by the president to “federalize our elections. ” and she tied the push to Trump’s repeated claims that if he and his party do not win in November elections. the outcome would have been rigged.
Steiner. an attorney who previously served as CEO of Waste Management. acknowledged that under the proposed rule the Postal Service would withhold ballots when the information is not provided—but he avoided offering a broader. unqualified stance. When Slotkin pressed him again—asking whether the Postal Service would refuse to send ballots to states that do not turn over the required information—Steiner said there is still only a proposed rule.
“Remember, right now we only have a proposed rule, so there are no new rules,” Steiner said. “We will move those ballots in accordance with whatever rule is in effect at that point in time.”
The proposal is tied to an executive order Trump signed in March that aims to increase federal oversight of elections. At least five lawsuits have challenged that executive order. but some of those cases have stalled because the policy has not yet been enacted. The comment period for the proposed Postal Service rule is open for the next week.
The hearing played out over a simple. high-pressure contradiction: Steiner described the request for a “manifest” as standard logistics to protect secure delivery. while Democrats pointed to the same mechanics as leverage—an ability to condition ballot movement on federal access to state voter-related information.
For now, the rule is still in the proposal stage. But Wednesday’s exchange made one point hard to miss: if the policy advances, the Postal Service would not be a neutral delivery system standing apart from election oversight—it would be a gatekeeper for ballots tied to what states choose to provide.
USPS Postal Service mail-in ballots voter lists manifest David Steiner Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Gary Peters Elissa Slotkin Donald Trump executive order election oversight Protect our Polls Act