Postmaster General Steiner: “There’s an injunction so we’re not doing anything”
United States Postal ServicePostmaster General of the United States, interviewed by the Associated Press
Postmaster General David Steiner told the Associated Press that work on the Federal Ballot Mail Portal had stopped because of the injunction, and declined to express a view on whether the rules themselves were warranted, describing his role as execution rather than decision.
“I don’t get to decide what rules that are put on us that I decide to accept or not accept. I looked at it more from the execution side.”
Reporting
Where this statement fits
Should Trump’s new mail-in voting restrictions apply to the 2026 midterms?
USPS’s new federal ballot-mail rule requires election officials to meet envelope standards, enroll voters through a federal portal and submit outgoing ballots for verification. The Trump administration argues these are lawful anti-fraud postal controls. Challenging states and civil-rights organizations say USPS is intruding into state-run elections and that the late rollout threatens voters’ access. On September 14, the Supreme Court left a temporary block in place for the 2026 election. Alito and Thomas would have allowed enforcement; Kavanaugh objected to applying the rule this year.
Source and context
Reporting
About this source
First on-record remarks by Postmaster General David Steiner on the ballot-mail rule. He says work on the Federal Ballot Mail Portal has stopped, that he had planned to unveil it around September 15, and that he approached the rule “from the execution side” rather than deciding its merits. The article also quotes an internal USPS memo to all employees, dated Wednesday September 16, stating the agency will not enforce the rules in the 2026 federal election. The memo itself is not public and exists here only as AP-quoted material. This is the PBS NewsHour syndication of the AP story; the AP original is at apnews.com/article/trump-mail-ballot-us-postal-service-995f98147fbb49fb71696be824abff95.
Archived copy (opens in a new tab)Before the quotation
Given after the Supreme Court declined on September 14 to lift the block on the rule for the 2026 election. Steiner had planned to unveil the Federal Ballot Mail Portal around September 15.
After the quotation
The same report quotes an internal USPS memo to all employees, dated September 16, saying the agency will “not be enforcing any of these new rules in the 2026 federal election” and that for Election Mail it is “business as usual.” Steiner separately indicated USPS intends to keep pressing envelope and barcode standards through pricing in future elections.
How this statement is classified
The label describes this statement's response within the context above.
Why this label?
On whether the USPS ballot-mail rule should apply to the 2026 midterms, Steiner expressly declines to take a position, disclaiming any role in deciding the rules and casting himself as executing them. His operational statements are compliance with a court order, not a view on the merits: “there’s an injunction so we’re not doing anything” says the rule will not apply, not that it should not. “Defended or excused” would misread his pride in the IT delivery as an endorsement of the policy; “Condemned” has no support in the text. The decline is explicit and quotable, which is what separates this from mere silence.
- Recorded on
- Published here
- People and groups discussed
- Donald Trump
More from this case
Read the full caseWhite House says the mail-voting order "added important safeguards" and denies improper interference with the Postal Service
The White House
“added important safeguards to vote-by-mail. These were commonsense measures to protect the security of mail-in ballots and to ensure only Americans vote in American elections.”Read statement
Republican county clerk says the USPS rule “doesn’t accomplish” what its proponents claim
“I think what to me is ironic about the USPS rule set is that it actually doesn’t accomplish what a lot of people in the political sphere are talking about it accomplishing, which is somehow this idea that USPS would prevent ineligible voters from casting an absentee ballot.”Read statement
RNC vows to keep backing Trump's mail-in voting restrictions
Republican National Committee
“The RNC will continue to back President Trump's efforts to secure elections... This fight is far from over, and Republicans will not rest until America's ballot box is fully protected.”Read statement
Share or embed this statement
The embed keeps its attribution link to The Dispute Index. Credit the image to The Dispute Index and link to the statement page.
Cite this record
- Publisher
- The Dispute Index
- Title
- Postmaster General Steiner: “There’s an injunction so we’re not doing anything”
- First published
- Last updated
- Permalink
- https://disputeindex.com/events/1075-postmaster-general-david-steiner-told-the-associated-press
Last updated marks the most recent saved version of this published statement.
The Dispute Index. "Postmaster General Steiner: “There’s an injunction so we’re not doing anything”". First published: 2026-09-18. Last updated: 2026-09-22. https://disputeindex.com/events/1075-postmaster-general-david-steiner-told-the-associated-press