Unions Slam Trump Takeover Reports

Reports that President Donald Trump could dissolve the board of governors at the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) bring more questions than answers regarding the future of the national courier. But unions comprising nearly 500,000 employed and retired postal workers are already up in arms over any possible change up top.

Late Thursday, the Washington Post reported that President Trump intends to sign an executive order that would fire the board members and bring the government agency under the control of the Commerce Department and Secretary Howard Lutnick.

The Wall Street Journal corroborated the report, which has been denied by the White House.

American Postal Workers Union (APWU) president Mark Dimondstein expressed his disappointment with the findings of the WaPo report, if true, calling the potential decision “an outrageous, unlawful attack on a storied national treasure.”

“Any attack on the Postal Service would be part of the billionaire oligarch coup, directed not just at the postal workers our union represents, but the millions of Americans who rely on the critical public service our members provide every single day,” said Dimondstein in a statement.

On Friday, National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) president Brian Renfroe, like Dimondstein, attacked the legality and constitutionality of the executive order, should President Trump choose to sign it.

“The Constitution, carefully crafted by our nation’s founders, gives Congress, not the president, a key role in setting postal policy. In fact, the Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 removed the Post Office Department from the president’s Cabinet and created USPS as the independent agency that exists today,” said Renfroe. “Americans should see this reported executive order for what it is: a direct attack on USPS employees, our universal service and every citizen who relies on the Postal Service.”

NALC is comprised 280,000 active and retired members of the USPS, while the APWU represents more than 200,000 USPS employees and retirees.

According to the Washington Post report, the board retained outside counsel Thursday and gave instructions to sue the White House if the president were to remove members of the board or attempt to alter the agency’s independent status. Board members are appointed by the U.S. president and confirmed by the Senate.

What becomes of the USPS and its 640,000 total employees if it gets moved under the Commerce Department is up in the air. President Trump has floated the idea of privatizing the agency, with his first administration making a push to do so. That proposal never gained support in Congress.

“Efforts to privatize the Postal Service, in whole or in part, or to strip it of its independence or public service mission, would be of no benefit to the American people,” Dimondstein said. “Instead, it would drive up postage rates and lead to reduced service, especially to rural America.”

Already feeling the heat from Amazon pushing into these communities, USPS would likely have to fend off possible changes to the “universal service obligation” that allows it to deliver to many of its rural areas consistently.

That obligation is designed to ensure that all U.S. postal users receive a baseline level of service at a reasonable price. If there is an attempt to cut costs at the courier via layoffs, more service consolidation or delivery schedule changes, rural committees would likely be impacted the most given their routes tend to already be the least profitable.

Signs of some sort of agency shakeup were indicated when Louis DeJoy unveiled his intention to step down as Postmaster General.

Appointed in June 2020 during the first Trump administration, DeJoy came into an agency that had already been losing money for years. But under his Deliver for America turnaround plan, which initially sought to bring the USPS back to break-even by 2023, the courier still mounted billions in losses.

After incurring $9.5 billion in losses in 2024, USPS forecasts ending 2025 with a $6.9 billion net loss.

Financial distress is one problem. But for an agency not intended to be judged by its profit margins, the bigger concern is the declining level of service across major markets.

Since the USPS implemented its Local Transportation Optimization (LTO) initiative as part of a wider nationwide network overhaul, the agency’s Office of Inspector General acknowledged the changes negatively impacted service, and “more significantly” among the rural population.

Residents in Atlanta, Hoston, Kansas City, Mo. and Richmond, Va., among other metropolitan areas, had complained about delayed mail deliveries in the wake of the service changes. Lawmakers scrutinized DeJoy across multiple hearings in 2024 over the delays, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that the Trump White House had been considering replacing him as Postmaster General.