WEBVTT - Can the Post Office Handle the Election? 0:00:15.396 --> 0:00:23.116 Pushkin from Pushkin Industries. This is Deep Background, the show 0:00:23.116 --> 0:00:26.396 where we explore the stories behind the stories in the news. 0:00:26.956 --> 0:00:30.596 I'm Noah Feldman. There's been a lot going on with 0:00:30.676 --> 0:00:35.196 the US Postal Service. In May, a new Postmaster General 0:00:35.476 --> 0:00:39.596 came into office, a businessman named Louis Dejoi, who is 0:00:39.636 --> 0:00:43.796 a big donor to the Trump campaign. After taking office, 0:00:44.036 --> 0:00:48.756 Dejoi instituted several cost cutting measures, like eliminating overtime pay 0:00:48.916 --> 0:00:53.156 for some workers, shortening post office hours, and other proposals 0:00:53.156 --> 0:00:56.476 that the Post Office said had long been under consideration. 0:00:57.436 --> 0:01:00.156 These changes and others led to concerns that the Post 0:01:00.196 --> 0:01:03.076 Office would not be equipped to handle an election in 0:01:03.076 --> 0:01:05.636 the middle of a pandemic because many more people than 0:01:05.716 --> 0:01:09.636 usual would be voting by mail. Many observers thought these 0:01:09.716 --> 0:01:13.796 changes were politically motivated, since Democrats might be more likely 0:01:13.836 --> 0:01:17.996 to vote by mail than Republicans. Now, DeJoy says these 0:01:18.076 --> 0:01:21.476 changes and others will be suspended until after the election. 0:01:22.556 --> 0:01:24.916 Here to help us make sense of all of this, 0:01:25.476 --> 0:01:27.636 how worried we should be and what really has been 0:01:27.676 --> 0:01:31.396 going on is Elaine Kamark. She's the director of the 0:01:31.396 --> 0:01:35.796 Center for Effective Public Management at the Brookings institution. She's 0:01:35.836 --> 0:01:38.836 been studying the post Office for years. She worked in 0:01:38.876 --> 0:01:42.316 Bill Clinton's White House on the Reinventing Government initiative, and 0:01:42.436 --> 0:01:45.636 for many years has been a participant in democratic politics. 0:01:46.156 --> 0:01:49.396 We spoke on Monday morning, Elaine, Thank you so much 0:01:49.436 --> 0:01:51.956 for joining us. I wonder if we could start with, 0:01:52.556 --> 0:01:56.076 to use an old fashioned expression, the facts which are 0:01:56.116 --> 0:02:00.316 not always prominent in our current moment of panic about 0:02:00.356 --> 0:02:02.476 the US Postal Service. So I want to start by 0:02:02.516 --> 0:02:07.836 going back before Louis Dejoi took over, and before he 0:02:07.916 --> 0:02:11.556 became the focal point of concerns about what's happening to 0:02:11.596 --> 0:02:16.876 the Postal Service? Where did this all start? In your view, Ironically, 0:02:17.116 --> 0:02:19.716 even though it's so much in the news now, this 0:02:19.796 --> 0:02:23.116 is a very very old story. I mean this is 0:02:23.156 --> 0:02:27.796 literally decades old, because the Post Office first started to 0:02:27.796 --> 0:02:31.236 get in trouble at the turn of the century, as 0:02:31.476 --> 0:02:36.556 first class mails began to disappear. The big, big hit 0:02:36.796 --> 0:02:40.236 to first class mail was when we stopped mailing in 0:02:40.316 --> 0:02:44.636 our bills and started paying our bills online, and that 0:02:44.796 --> 0:02:48.476 really decimated first class mail. And that was the post 0:02:48.516 --> 0:02:52.276 Office's highest return. I mean, that was this most profitable 0:02:52.476 --> 0:02:56.596 and the post Office has been forbidden for many years 0:02:56.676 --> 0:03:01.876 from really going into entrepreneurial activities. To make a long 0:03:01.956 --> 0:03:04.716 story short, let me say that the Post Office has 0:03:04.756 --> 0:03:08.556 been in trouble for two decades. It has needed to 0:03:08.636 --> 0:03:11.516 adjust us to the new world where we have much, 0:03:11.636 --> 0:03:16.596 much less mail, and both political parties have been really 0:03:16.676 --> 0:03:20.556 reluctant to do anything about the Post Office. And so 0:03:20.636 --> 0:03:23.076 this comes kind of as a for those of us 0:03:23.116 --> 0:03:25.316 who have studied the post Office for a long time. 0:03:25.396 --> 0:03:27.436 This is kind of like, oh my god, the whole 0:03:27.436 --> 0:03:30.596 world is suddenly discovering what the crisis is at the 0:03:30.596 --> 0:03:33.316 post Office. I want to ask you a follow up 0:03:33.436 --> 0:03:36.516 question to that before we dive into this summer's controversy, 0:03:36.556 --> 0:03:40.676 and it's this, I'm always confused, as someone who's interested 0:03:40.716 --> 0:03:43.676 in government but not a post office expert, by what 0:03:43.756 --> 0:03:46.556 seemed like two contradictory strands in the kind of discussion 0:03:46.596 --> 0:03:49.356 that you were just briefly describing. On the one hand, 0:03:49.516 --> 0:03:52.076 we hear the post office being treated like a business. 0:03:52.436 --> 0:03:55.556 It's losing money, it's not making a profit. It's lost 0:03:55.596 --> 0:03:58.676 it's customers. You know, it's a money loser for the government. 0:03:59.836 --> 0:04:02.116 On the other hand, we have this counter narrative that 0:04:02.196 --> 0:04:05.396 the post Office is a public service, a public good. 0:04:05.796 --> 0:04:07.996 We shouldn't even be thinking about it from this perspective 0:04:08.036 --> 0:04:10.636 as a competitor or as a business because it's there 0:04:10.676 --> 0:04:14.116 to deliver the mail through wind and snow and sleet 0:04:14.196 --> 0:04:16.356 and hail and to get it to everybody, none of 0:04:16.356 --> 0:04:19.836 which is designed to make money. So help me out here. 0:04:19.916 --> 0:04:22.236 You know which way should we be thinking about the 0:04:22.276 --> 0:04:24.916 post Office? Well, in two ways. First of all, the 0:04:24.956 --> 0:04:28.476 post Office is in the constitution. Okay, it's the only 0:04:28.636 --> 0:04:32.516 public agency in the constitution, and it is very important 0:04:32.516 --> 0:04:36.356 for the purpose of binding the country together. So the 0:04:36.356 --> 0:04:41.316 most important public aspect of the post Office is universal service. 0:04:41.476 --> 0:04:45.356 Is the universal service pledge that basically, no matter how 0:04:45.436 --> 0:04:49.076 far down the road you live in rural Montana, you 0:04:49.156 --> 0:04:51.916 can get something from the post office. So that's the 0:04:52.636 --> 0:04:56.796 rock bottom public service. Now, the question then gets a 0:04:56.796 --> 0:04:59.436 little bit blurry when you get to the business side, right, 0:04:59.716 --> 0:05:04.876 because the question is can post office maintain universal public 0:05:04.916 --> 0:05:08.756 service and not lose as much money? I think they can. 0:05:09.236 --> 0:05:12.316 There's going to have to be adjustments in service down 0:05:12.356 --> 0:05:16.116 the line. Now, the Post Office itself has been closing 0:05:16.676 --> 0:05:22.316 sorting facilities, they've been changing things up, they move mailboxes 0:05:22.356 --> 0:05:24.836 all the time, by the way. Okay, so that's a 0:05:24.836 --> 0:05:27.876 little bit of a paranoia that's out there. People who 0:05:27.876 --> 0:05:32.636 have been sendating pictures of mailboxes on trucks. That happens 0:05:32.676 --> 0:05:37.676 all the time. And so there's this ongoing debate about 0:05:37.716 --> 0:05:41.596 how do you maintain universal service and not lose as 0:05:41.716 --> 0:05:45.276 much money. Nobody, I think in the Congress Oran government 0:05:45.476 --> 0:05:48.596 expects the post Office to make money. But the question 0:05:48.716 --> 0:05:50.836 is they have been losing loads and loads of money, 0:05:51.196 --> 0:05:54.316 and how can you do these two things? And it's 0:05:54.396 --> 0:05:58.236 quite difficult. But one of the things discussed all the time, 0:05:58.636 --> 0:06:02.156 for instance, ending Saturday service. We all are used to 0:06:02.196 --> 0:06:05.436 get email on Saturday and just not on Sunday. The 0:06:05.596 --> 0:06:08.836 question is could we end Saturday service? And that's one 0:06:08.876 --> 0:06:10.516 of the things that's out there, and then there's a 0:06:10.516 --> 0:06:13.436 lot of other ideas out there. I can't resist mentioning, 0:06:13.516 --> 0:06:16.396 by the way, that the one time in my own 0:06:16.436 --> 0:06:19.196 academic work that I ever came across a big fight 0:06:19.276 --> 0:06:22.436 about the post office was in the early nineteenth century, 0:06:22.916 --> 0:06:25.596 so almost exactly two hundred years ago, when there was 0:06:25.636 --> 0:06:27.836 a huge fight about Sunday service. It turns out the 0:06:27.876 --> 0:06:30.076 post office used to deliver the mail on Sunday. And 0:06:30.076 --> 0:06:35.796 this became a controversy because the more secular oriented, questionable 0:06:35.836 --> 0:06:39.156 blasphemer types in small towns like to hang out in 0:06:39.156 --> 0:06:40.836 the post office. Because in a lot of places in 0:06:40.876 --> 0:06:43.716 the United States, especially in new places, the only public 0:06:43.716 --> 0:06:47.076 place to congregate that wasn't church was the post office. 0:06:47.316 --> 0:06:49.516 And ministers were really upset that there was a sort 0:06:49.516 --> 0:06:52.316 of competing venue on Sunday mornings, and they started a 0:06:52.476 --> 0:06:56.596 national movement to shut down Sunday service, and they actually 0:06:56.676 --> 0:07:01.236 succeeded astonishingly, which is sort of unbelievable. And their speeches 0:07:01.276 --> 0:07:05.836 in Congress by a congressman making the first important argument 0:07:05.876 --> 0:07:08.716 for the separation of church and state ever made in Congress, 0:07:09.276 --> 0:07:12.156 somebody saying, well, we're not a Christian country, really, so 0:07:12.236 --> 0:07:14.836 therefore we should continue to have service on Sunding. Other 0:07:14.836 --> 0:07:16.276 people saying, what are you talking about. You know, this 0:07:16.316 --> 0:07:18.836 is a terrible blasphemy. Anyway, it's a genuine digression. But 0:07:18.956 --> 0:07:21.716 sometimes on deep background we digress a little bit. That's 0:07:21.796 --> 0:07:25.316 that's terrific. I want to turn now to this summer, 0:07:25.676 --> 0:07:28.156 coming all the way up to the present, and early 0:07:28.196 --> 0:07:30.796 in the summer, the Post Office was talking about cost 0:07:30.836 --> 0:07:34.076 cutting that was already beginning to delay mail delivery by 0:07:34.156 --> 0:07:36.676 up to a week in some places. And it also 0:07:36.876 --> 0:07:40.156 was saying that it was going to decommission ten percent 0:07:40.236 --> 0:07:44.436 of the sorting machines that it uses. Were these things, 0:07:44.476 --> 0:07:47.276 in your view, continuous with the kinds of reform that 0:07:47.356 --> 0:07:49.756 happens all the time, sort of like moving around the 0:07:49.756 --> 0:07:52.396 post office boxes on a big scale, or were these 0:07:52.436 --> 0:07:57.596 things already part of some possibly coordinated plan to slow 0:07:57.636 --> 0:08:03.476 down mail in advance of the upcoming pandemic election. Well, 0:08:03.516 --> 0:08:09.316 the Post Office says these were continuous, and the Democrats 0:08:09.556 --> 0:08:13.276 think that this was part of a plan. Here's the 0:08:13.316 --> 0:08:17.556 way I would answer that if Donald Trump had not 0:08:17.996 --> 0:08:21.956 made a huge deal and a huge attack on mail 0:08:22.036 --> 0:08:26.516 in ballots, my guess is this would have passed relatively unnoticed. 0:08:27.356 --> 0:08:31.636 But Donald Trump, at about the same time began railing 0:08:31.716 --> 0:08:35.236 against mail in ballots and encouraging people not to use 0:08:35.316 --> 0:08:38.796 them and saying that these systems were corrupt, which, by 0:08:38.796 --> 0:08:41.716 the way, there is not a shred of evidence too. 0:08:42.316 --> 0:08:46.476 And so it was the conjunction of some of these 0:08:46.556 --> 0:08:49.476 cuts and some of these cost savings, some of which 0:08:49.516 --> 0:08:53.916 would have been probably business as usual, and Donald Trump 0:08:54.396 --> 0:08:58.036 railing against mail in ballots. That made everybody say, hey, 0:08:58.076 --> 0:09:01.276 wait a minute, is he trying to suppress the vote? 0:09:01.756 --> 0:09:05.876 Is he trying to keep people from voting? Now, he's 0:09:05.916 --> 0:09:08.716 been all over the place on this. Trump has, but 0:09:08.916 --> 0:09:14.036 he seems to be particularly geared up against mail in 0:09:14.196 --> 0:09:16.996 ballots in the states that are universal mail in ballots 0:09:17.076 --> 0:09:19.996 as opposed to absentee ballots. But the fact of the 0:09:20.036 --> 0:09:23.916 matter is that any slowdown in the mail in election 0:09:24.116 --> 0:09:29.316 season would in fact affect ballots. Even though the Post 0:09:29.396 --> 0:09:33.636 Office has always treated ballots this is interesting. They've always 0:09:33.676 --> 0:09:38.876 treated ballots as first class mail, as privileged mail, regardless 0:09:38.916 --> 0:09:42.516 of no stamp, what kind of stamp, bulk mail, whatever, 0:09:42.836 --> 0:09:47.156 It's always been treated as privileged mail. Many fascinating things, 0:09:47.156 --> 0:09:48.716 and what you just said, let me start with a 0:09:48.756 --> 0:09:50.556 small one and then moved to the bigger one. The 0:09:50.636 --> 0:09:54.676 small one about the Post Office traditionally treating your ballot 0:09:54.676 --> 0:09:56.596 as first class mail even if you didn't put first 0:09:56.596 --> 0:10:02.556 class postage on it. CNN reports that there were plans 0:10:02.716 --> 0:10:06.996 in place, or at least documents in the Post Office 0:10:07.036 --> 0:10:09.996 being produced over the course of the summer that said, 0:10:10.076 --> 0:10:13.316 let's change that policy and let's only deliver ballots as 0:10:13.316 --> 0:10:15.836 first class may if they have first class postage. The 0:10:15.916 --> 0:10:18.956 Post Office says those weren't official policy documents. I'm not 0:10:18.956 --> 0:10:21.756 sure what they mean by that, and Louis Dejoi has said, 0:10:21.756 --> 0:10:24.156 don't worry, we're not going to make that change. What 0:10:24.236 --> 0:10:26.876 do you think about that particular small debate. I don't 0:10:26.876 --> 0:10:29.036 think it's so small. I mean, I think that is 0:10:29.116 --> 0:10:32.756 one piece of evidence that Louie de joy was getting 0:10:32.916 --> 0:10:36.236 White House pressure on this issue. I've been in a 0:10:36.276 --> 0:10:39.396 White House, and the way it works is the President 0:10:39.436 --> 0:10:43.196 doesn't always have to say to the postmaster general, hey, 0:10:43.716 --> 0:10:47.756 you should stop treating ballots as first class mail. But 0:10:48.156 --> 0:10:53.236 if the president is spending week after week tweeting about 0:10:53.316 --> 0:10:56.156 the disastrous things that will happen if we have an 0:10:56.156 --> 0:11:00.276 election by mail, a postmaster general might say, hey, this 0:11:00.356 --> 0:11:02.956 is a good policy. We can stop this and please 0:11:02.996 --> 0:11:06.316 the White House. And they got caught, pure and simple, 0:11:06.356 --> 0:11:09.116 they got caught in something that they should have never 0:11:09.116 --> 0:11:13.756 ever considered, never considered doing this. I mean, it goes 0:11:13.796 --> 0:11:16.796 so far back that postal workers have been known to 0:11:16.876 --> 0:11:22.556 buy hand take ballots out of the sorting process in 0:11:22.636 --> 0:11:25.356 order to make sure that they were delivered first class. 0:11:25.356 --> 0:11:28.076 And delivered immediately. So this is a long tradition with 0:11:28.156 --> 0:11:32.516 the post office. It's important to democracy. The postal workers 0:11:32.556 --> 0:11:36.996 see their mission as doing this and look, they got caught. 0:11:37.156 --> 0:11:40.476 That's what happened. This is particularly fascinating at the big 0:11:40.516 --> 0:11:44.556 picture level because the detail then leads to the big impact. 0:11:45.316 --> 0:11:47.676 If I'm hearing you correctly, and tell me if I am, 0:11:48.236 --> 0:11:50.796 this is a kind of signature Trump move. He doesn't 0:11:50.836 --> 0:11:53.876 know the details. He starts out with a public attack 0:11:54.236 --> 0:11:56.116 on mail and balloting because he doesn't like it, and 0:11:56.156 --> 0:11:58.516 also because he's trying to discourage and confuse people from 0:11:58.636 --> 0:12:02.116 using it. Then he puts in place a postmaster general. 0:12:02.156 --> 0:12:03.956 He can't do it directly because of the way the 0:12:03.996 --> 0:12:06.836 post Office is set up, but via his appointees, he 0:12:06.916 --> 0:12:10.436 indirectly is able to influence the appointment of a Postmaster 0:12:10.556 --> 0:12:13.996 General who actually starts flirting in a serious way with 0:12:14.116 --> 0:12:18.076 changes that actually would potentially affect delivery of the mail. 0:12:18.796 --> 0:12:21.516 And although we don't know, I take it. How many 0:12:21.636 --> 0:12:24.676 ballots in the past have been submitted with less than 0:12:24.716 --> 0:12:28.276 a first class postage and got en treated as having postage. 0:12:28.436 --> 0:12:30.236 It's a kind of change to the culture, is what 0:12:30.236 --> 0:12:32.516 you're saying there's a kind of cultural norm in the 0:12:32.556 --> 0:12:35.156 Post Office that one of our jobs, in terms of 0:12:35.156 --> 0:12:37.596 delivering a public service is to get people's ballots in. 0:12:37.676 --> 0:12:40.236 That just seems really, really important as a civic matter. 0:12:40.436 --> 0:12:43.996 And here you have Post Office officials talking not openly 0:12:44.036 --> 0:12:46.596 but within the Post Office about just not doing that, 0:12:46.916 --> 0:12:48.996 thereby sending the message that are kind of on board 0:12:48.996 --> 0:12:51.476 with the president, and then they get caught, as you say, 0:12:51.716 --> 0:12:55.156 and then this adds up to a huge public worry 0:12:55.196 --> 0:12:58.596 and concern and debate, which maybe what Trump wanted in 0:12:58.636 --> 0:13:02.076 the first place. This is par for the course for 0:13:02.196 --> 0:13:06.916 his presidency. He says things based on no knowledge, he 0:13:07.316 --> 0:13:11.196 gets them in motion, and then time after time we 0:13:11.316 --> 0:13:16.716 see his appointees and his aids scurrying around to try 0:13:16.756 --> 0:13:20.196 to make it actually happen, and then we see blowing 0:13:20.276 --> 0:13:22.996 up in his face. I mean, one of the ironies 0:13:23.036 --> 0:13:26.796 of this is that if you try to assess rational 0:13:27.636 --> 0:13:32.396 thinking to the president, it just does work. And let 0:13:32.396 --> 0:13:35.396 me give you the clearest example. The five states that 0:13:35.516 --> 0:13:38.596 have mail in ballots and have used them for quite 0:13:38.636 --> 0:13:46.476 some time are Oregon solidly democratic, Washington solidly democratic, California 0:13:46.876 --> 0:13:53.116 solidly democratic, Hawaii, the District of Columbia solidly Democratic. Then 0:13:53.156 --> 0:13:56.836 you have Colorado, which is potentially a swing state, and Utah, 0:13:56.916 --> 0:14:00.796 which is a Republican state. Now, if Donald Trump thinks 0:14:01.356 --> 0:14:04.916 that he can argue that the election was stolen from 0:14:05.036 --> 0:14:08.156 him because without mail ballots he would have won California, 0:14:09.196 --> 0:14:12.116 that is preposterous on the face of it. And nobody's 0:14:12.116 --> 0:14:13.876 going to believe it. I mean, they'll just laugh him. 0:14:13.876 --> 0:14:15.876 But I don't even think he'll get to court on 0:14:15.996 --> 0:14:19.516 that one. But he's clearly trying to set up an 0:14:19.556 --> 0:14:23.716 excuse for why he's not going to win. And this 0:14:23.756 --> 0:14:27.276 makes no sense, right, It just makes no sense whatsoever, 0:14:27.796 --> 0:14:31.316 as are so many of Donald Trump's purported policy moves. 0:14:32.276 --> 0:14:43.596 We'll be back in a moment. One of the things 0:14:43.676 --> 0:14:46.516 that most upset me in the Post Office story over 0:14:46.556 --> 0:14:49.996 the summer was the report in the Washington Post that 0:14:50.116 --> 0:14:53.436 at the end of July, the General Counsel and Executive 0:14:53.516 --> 0:14:57.276 Vice President of the Post Office, Thomas Marshall, sent letters 0:14:57.596 --> 0:15:01.676 to forty six states and the District of Columbia basically saying, 0:15:02.396 --> 0:15:05.756 we're not at all shore. In fact, we doubt that 0:15:05.836 --> 0:15:10.876 we can get mail in ballots too you in time 0:15:10.996 --> 0:15:15.356 for you to count them in relation to the election. Now, 0:15:15.356 --> 0:15:17.836 this was done privately, so this we can't attribute to 0:15:17.876 --> 0:15:20.276 a Trumpian plan, or I can't attribute to a Trumpian 0:15:20.316 --> 0:15:23.916 plan to try to influence public opinion because they did 0:15:23.956 --> 0:15:27.476 it quietly, and in fact, it took some doing on 0:15:27.516 --> 0:15:29.836 the part of the newspaper to get the story out. 0:15:30.796 --> 0:15:33.636 What's your interpretation of what was going on with this letter? 0:15:33.716 --> 0:15:37.036 Were they making a record in advance in case things 0:15:37.076 --> 0:15:39.636 went wrong later? What's your read You spent a lot 0:15:39.676 --> 0:15:41.716 of time inside of government. You know exactly about the 0:15:41.756 --> 0:15:45.476 different motivations, including the Cya motivations that are there in 0:15:45.516 --> 0:15:47.876 play for a letter like this. Well, I think it's 0:15:47.876 --> 0:15:51.836 a Cya motivation for sure. But I think that the 0:15:51.876 --> 0:15:55.036 thing about coming November is that we had all these 0:15:55.076 --> 0:15:59.476 primaries happening in twenty twenty, and the primaries taught the 0:15:59.596 --> 0:16:03.876 states important things about what's going to happen in November. 0:16:04.556 --> 0:16:08.356 So one of the things that happened is absentee ballot. 0:16:08.476 --> 0:16:12.396 The ballots didn't arrive on time. A lot of ballots 0:16:12.436 --> 0:16:15.756 came in after election day because the mail was slow. 0:16:16.636 --> 0:16:20.116 What states have done in response to this, in other words, 0:16:20.116 --> 0:16:21.956 the Post Office said we may not be able to 0:16:21.996 --> 0:16:24.316 get these in in time for you to count. Well. 0:16:24.356 --> 0:16:27.036 At my last count, there were somewhere in the neighborhood 0:16:27.036 --> 0:16:30.156 of twenty five states about half the states that they 0:16:30.236 --> 0:16:35.196 actually have either laws or administrative regulations on the books 0:16:35.236 --> 0:16:39.476 saying that they will count ballots up to five days 0:16:39.556 --> 0:16:42.316 after election day and in some states up to ten 0:16:42.396 --> 0:16:46.036 days after election day. So as long as people are 0:16:46.436 --> 0:16:49.916 putting their ballot in the mail on election day, there 0:16:49.956 --> 0:16:51.636 are a lot of states that are going to count 0:16:51.676 --> 0:16:54.116 your ballot, even if the mail is slow, and even 0:16:54.156 --> 0:16:56.556 if it takes a while to get there. And I 0:16:56.596 --> 0:17:00.316 think that that's been a reaction to that letter, to 0:17:00.356 --> 0:17:03.316 the possibility that the mail will be slow. It's also 0:17:03.356 --> 0:17:06.116 a reaction to the fact that states are going to 0:17:06.236 --> 0:17:10.436 take longer to account the vote. Will not know the 0:17:10.516 --> 0:17:15.276 outcome of many elections on election night in November, because 0:17:15.316 --> 0:17:17.996 first of all, we will only have exi polling from 0:17:18.596 --> 0:17:22.956 the people who vote in person, and that looks like 0:17:22.996 --> 0:17:26.596 that's going to be a heavily Republican vote. In some states, 0:17:26.676 --> 0:17:30.956 the exipole people will be able to sample absentee ballot 0:17:31.076 --> 0:17:35.156 voters in the states that have that data. In other states, 0:17:35.156 --> 0:17:37.196 they won't be able to do that at all. And 0:17:37.276 --> 0:17:39.636 of course if things are close, we really may not 0:17:39.836 --> 0:17:43.956 know for days or weeks. Who want a given state. Now, 0:17:43.996 --> 0:17:47.956 if it's a landslide for Biden or for Trump, then 0:17:47.996 --> 0:17:51.036 in fact, they'll probably know pretty well on election night 0:17:51.116 --> 0:17:53.596 or certainly the day after. But we have to get 0:17:53.636 --> 0:17:56.036 ready for the fact that if you want an honest vote, 0:17:56.396 --> 0:17:57.996 you're gonna have to wait for all the votes to 0:17:58.036 --> 0:18:02.396 be counted. And it's not just the ballots arriving late 0:18:02.476 --> 0:18:05.676 in the mail. It's also the fact that the states 0:18:05.716 --> 0:18:10.036 have never counted this many absentee ballots before, so they're 0:18:10.116 --> 0:18:14.476 having to buy new scanners, they're having to increase their 0:18:14.516 --> 0:18:19.116 staff for the counting procedure, etc. And so the election 0:18:19.196 --> 0:18:22.956 night will not be what we're used to. That brings 0:18:23.036 --> 0:18:26.036 us to what I would maybe not call the nightmare scenario, 0:18:26.116 --> 0:18:28.596 but definitely they lose a lot of sleepover its scenario. 0:18:29.156 --> 0:18:33.516 So in this scenario, there are crucial swing states where 0:18:33.596 --> 0:18:36.916 Donald Trump says late at night on election night or 0:18:36.996 --> 0:18:41.076 even the next day, look, I won those states because 0:18:41.756 --> 0:18:43.756 they've counted the ballots that they've got, They've counted the 0:18:43.756 --> 0:18:46.036 people who voted and their exit polls, and they all 0:18:46.076 --> 0:18:51.836 show me winning those states because, as you mentioned, Republicans seem, 0:18:51.956 --> 0:18:54.956 at least based on current polling data, more likely to 0:18:54.996 --> 0:18:58.356 be willing to brave the dangers of COVID and show 0:18:58.436 --> 0:19:01.876 up at the polls. Meanwhile, Joe Biden is saying, wait 0:19:01.876 --> 0:19:04.076 a minute, there are still lots of votes in these 0:19:04.116 --> 0:19:05.916 swing states that are crucial to the outcome of the 0:19:05.956 --> 0:19:08.956 election that haven't been counted yet, and it's going to 0:19:09.156 --> 0:19:14.636 take Awhile, then we get legal battles in these individual states, 0:19:15.556 --> 0:19:19.356 with Trump lawyers saying, don't count these ballots for whatever reason, 0:19:19.836 --> 0:19:22.596 and Biden lawyers saying count them. And if I sound 0:19:22.636 --> 0:19:24.676 a little traumatized in describing this, it's because I was 0:19:24.996 --> 0:19:27.596 as a young lawyer in Palm Beach County in two 0:19:27.596 --> 0:19:30.756 thousand litigating on behalf of al Gore. And then that 0:19:30.836 --> 0:19:35.316 becomes a real genuine mess, which opens the door for 0:19:35.356 --> 0:19:38.076 the election to be thrown into the courts or otherwise 0:19:38.756 --> 0:19:43.716 seriously questioned. How probable is it that they will really 0:19:43.756 --> 0:19:48.076 be uncounted votes within the margin of victory for Joe 0:19:48.076 --> 0:19:52.156 Biden that are really still uncounted. Well, it's hard to say, 0:19:52.436 --> 0:19:55.316 but a lot of this is going to depend actually 0:19:55.356 --> 0:19:59.716 on the networks, because if the networks rush to judgment, 0:20:00.556 --> 0:20:05.716 they will add to the sense of chaos and uncertainty 0:20:06.276 --> 0:20:11.436 and really strengthen hand of Trump and the people who 0:20:11.436 --> 0:20:15.396 want confusion in this. So the networks need to be 0:20:15.556 --> 0:20:19.596 super super super cautious, and frankly, a lot of this 0:20:19.676 --> 0:20:22.956 is going to depend on what Fox News does. If 0:20:22.956 --> 0:20:26.796 Fox News plays along with the President, then they will 0:20:26.916 --> 0:20:30.716 call his victory way too early, way long before they should, 0:20:31.396 --> 0:20:36.196 and without regard to the other networks and the data 0:20:36.236 --> 0:20:39.516 coming in, and then you can have a mess. If 0:20:39.556 --> 0:20:44.676 Fox News behaves itself and acts like the other networks 0:20:44.676 --> 0:20:50.556 in terms of waiting for exapole data, absentee ballot sampling 0:20:50.676 --> 0:20:53.956 data and then actual key votes and key precincts to 0:20:53.996 --> 0:20:57.996 be reported and then make their call, then my guess 0:20:58.156 --> 0:21:01.196 is that Trump will file suit, but it will not 0:21:01.356 --> 0:21:05.276 have the same impact. So the player here that's kind 0:21:05.316 --> 0:21:09.676 of most crucial is in fact they are in fact networks. 0:21:10.836 --> 0:21:13.876 What is your biggest worry about the mechanics of this 0:21:13.996 --> 0:21:17.516 coming election? Of the panoply of dangers that you've mentioned 0:21:18.156 --> 0:21:22.076 for the universal mail in ballot states and we're up 0:21:22.076 --> 0:21:26.956 to nine now, interesting enough. In spite of the president's rantings, 0:21:27.316 --> 0:21:30.356 more states since he began talking about this, have adopted 0:21:30.756 --> 0:21:34.756 universal mail in ballots. In the universal mail in ballot states, 0:21:35.276 --> 0:21:38.996 I think the system will go fairly smoothly. There's only 0:21:39.076 --> 0:21:42.756 one step to take the ballot that's mailed to registered voters. 0:21:43.156 --> 0:21:47.076 The registered voter mails it back. As we've seen, the 0:21:47.316 --> 0:21:52.356 volume of mail an extra mail expected on election day 0:21:52.396 --> 0:21:55.796 in an election week is a fraction of the volume 0:21:55.796 --> 0:21:59.276 of mail that the Post office handles at Christmas. Okay, 0:21:59.356 --> 0:22:03.756 So this whole business about being overwhelmed by ballots, it's 0:22:03.796 --> 0:22:07.236 just nonsense. I mean, the Post Office can in fact 0:22:07.596 --> 0:22:10.476 take care of the ballots in those states. I think 0:22:10.476 --> 0:22:13.436 it will go fairly smoothly. I think there will be 0:22:13.476 --> 0:22:18.476 other states where the absentee ballot process will get screwed 0:22:18.556 --> 0:22:22.356 up and people won't get their ballots. And we saw 0:22:22.436 --> 0:22:26.316 that happen in the primaries. And then here's the catch, 0:22:26.396 --> 0:22:29.996 and here's where here's my biggest worry. My biggest worry 0:22:30.116 --> 0:22:33.916 is that states will see a huge volume of absentee 0:22:33.956 --> 0:22:38.796 ballot requests because the mail is slow, or because people 0:22:40.076 --> 0:22:42.836 they get their mail, but then they lose their ballot etc. 0:22:43.716 --> 0:22:46.036 A lot of those people will end up going to 0:22:46.076 --> 0:22:49.916 the polls on election day. But the States, and they 0:22:49.956 --> 0:22:53.476 did this in the primaries. The States said, oh, well, 0:22:53.516 --> 0:22:55.396 look at all these people voting apps and tee, we 0:22:55.436 --> 0:22:58.956 only need to open one polling place or two polling places. 0:22:59.716 --> 0:23:02.396 And I think what they are going to have to do, 0:23:02.636 --> 0:23:06.396 and we're urging them to do this, open as many 0:23:06.516 --> 0:23:10.316 polling places as they can, because that's the fail safe. 0:23:10.756 --> 0:23:13.876 If you ask for your absentee ballot application, you didn't 0:23:13.876 --> 0:23:17.676 get it, then okay, election day comes, you can go 0:23:18.196 --> 0:23:21.556 to a polling place. And what we saw happen in 0:23:21.556 --> 0:23:26.156 the primaries was states that tried sending out ballots for 0:23:26.196 --> 0:23:29.596 the first time to everybody, or states that sent out 0:23:29.636 --> 0:23:33.116 absentee ballots some of them just didn't arrive, or maybe 0:23:33.116 --> 0:23:36.636 they arrived and people lost them or whatever. You need 0:23:36.676 --> 0:23:40.436 to have polling places open. Whenever government is in a 0:23:40.476 --> 0:23:44.596 transition between one system and another, they have to do 0:23:44.676 --> 0:23:48.556 something which seems really inefficient in the short run. They 0:23:48.596 --> 0:23:52.316 have to keep both systems up and running. Now, a 0:23:52.396 --> 0:23:57.276 business would hate this because it's so redundant, but government 0:23:57.356 --> 0:24:00.556 is not business. Eventually, people are going to figure out, 0:24:00.676 --> 0:24:04.996 oh yeah, voting by mail is much more convenient. Those trends, 0:24:05.036 --> 0:24:07.876 by the way, we're happening long before COVID. We had 0:24:07.876 --> 0:24:11.716 a steady trend up in voting by mail beginning in 0:24:11.916 --> 0:24:16.236 nineteen ninety six, was steadily increasing. So it was happening anyway. 0:24:16.676 --> 0:24:21.156 But you cannot rush to close down the polling places 0:24:21.156 --> 0:24:24.236 because that's the fail safe in the system. Elaine, thank 0:24:24.276 --> 0:24:27.996 you very much for your clear eyed, clear thinking analysis 0:24:28.116 --> 0:24:30.956 of these tough issues and for helping us get behind 0:24:31.076 --> 0:24:34.276 the headlines into the meet and substance of the challenges 0:24:34.316 --> 0:24:36.836 that we're facing in the election regarding the Post Office 0:24:37.236 --> 0:24:40.396