USPS will stop removing mail-sorting machines until after the election

The United States Postal Service today suspended measures that caused mail-delivery delays across the country in recent weeks, including an initiative designed to remove hundreds of mail-sorting machines from active rotation. There are no public plans to reinstate machines that have already been taken offline, but starting today, no additional units will be removed from service until after the US presidential election in November. Vice reported last week that the USPS had begun retiring mail-sorting machines across the country "without any official explanation or reason given," significantly slowing employees' ability to organize and send mail. A total of 671 machines, or 10 percent of the postal service's stock, were scheduled to be taken offline, according to The Washington Post. This was part of a larger initiative to "strengthen the Postal Service" by Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, who joined the USPS in June after 35 years as an executive at a large supply-chain logistics company.