Virginia Democrats sue USPS over delayed delivery of election-related material
(CNN) — The Virginia Democratic Party filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Postal Service on Friday, alleging local branches failed to deliver and process election-related material ahead of its high stakes gubernatorial race, thereby “threatening to disenfranchise thousands of Virginia voters.”
The organization says delays in election-related mail across Albemarle County, which includes the city of Charlottesville, James City County, which is adjacent to Williamsburg, and the area of Portsmouth near Norfolk, are “particularly egregious,” according to the lawsuit.
Friday’s lawsuit was filed less than two weeks before the closely watched governor’s race between Terry McAuliffe and Glenn Youngkin. Democrats are hoping to hold onto the governor’s mansion and maintain control of the state legislature, while Youngkin seeks to be Virginia’s first Republican to win a statewide election since 2009.
“Thousands of ballots delivered to postal facilities by the general registrars weeks ago are still outstanding and, weeks later, have not yet even been scanned into USPS’s system. Even if these voters do eventually receive their ballots before Election Day, the slowdowns promise that they will not have sufficient time to send them back with assurance that they will arrive in time to be counted,” the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court says.
“And even if a ballot reaches the appropriate election official before the receipt deadline, if the official identifies any issues with it that require remediation before it may be counted, the voter will have run out of time to rectify the problem.”
Voters across Virginia had until 5 p.m, ET, Friday to request a mail-in ballot to be sent to them to cast a vote in the November 2 election, according to the state’s Department of Elections.
USPS, under Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s leadership, recently implemented new service standards that include longer first-class mail delivery times and cuts to post office hours. The changes were part of DeJoy’s 10-year plan to help the embattled agency be more competitive and improve its financial situation.
Virginia joined 20 other states in suing USPS last year, pushing back on the agency’s changes that disrupted mail delivery across the country and triggered accusations that former President Donald Trump and his appointees were trying to undermine mail-in voting.
In its lawsuit, the Virginia Democratic Party said the thousands of unscanned ballots in the three counties as of Tuesday make up more than a quarter of all ballots voters requested, based on Virginia Department of Elections data.
The lawsuit also said that the average percentage of unscanned ballots across the state was 10% — more than 25,000 ballots issued to voters — as of Tuesday.
James City County’s director of elections, Dianna Moorman, confirmed in a statement that they are “aware of the anomaly” and have been in touch with the Virginia Department of Elections and the USPS.
Moorman said that all the ballots the county has an application for have been issued, and that the county has received more than 57% of the “USPS/email issued ballots” back from voters to date.
In the last Virginia governor race in 2017, Albemarle County and Portsmouth went to Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam, while his GOP opponent Ed Gillespie narrowly won James City County.
The three counties, which the Virginia Democratic Party allege are experiencing significant delays, all voted for President Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, with a slim victory for Biden in James City County.