On the recordMarch 1, 2022
I rise today in support of the legislation that my colleague from Michigan just talked about. This is H.R. 3076, the Postal Service Reform Act. What it really is, though, is ensuring that the post office works, that it works for the constituents whom I represent and people all around the country. Unfortunately, right now, the post office is in trouble. It is in dire need of reform, and if we don't do it, we are going to have big problems. The post office just had its 15th consecutive annual net loss in 2021, and they projected they are going to be insolvent in the next few years unless we make these reforms and other reforms as well that can be made by the post office itself. In fact, they project a 10-year loss of $160 billion if we just continue with the status quo. The reality is that the Postal Service is delivering less and less first-class mail. We are all online. We are not sending as many letters as we used to. Yet there are more and more addresses that they deliver to because more and more people want to get the mail they do deliver, the packages, the direct mail, and so on. So it doesn't work. It is a recipe for ruin if we don't adjust to the new reality and make some necessary changes. Last year, Senator Peters and I did introduce the legislation he talked about. We had 26 cosponsors, equally divided between Republicans and Democrats. We kept this bipartisan from the start. In fact, I would even say we tried to keep it nonpartisan.…
