For those wondering what it would take to remove Postmaster General Louis DeJoy from his post, there were some developments of note in the Senate yesterday. C-SPAN’s Craig Caplan reported:
[The] Senate today by unanimous consent confirmed Dan Tangherlini (D) and Derek Kan (R), President Biden’s two nominees to serve on the U.S. Postal Service Board of Governors, which now has a majority of the Senate-confirmed Biden appointees on the USPS board.
For those who may need a refresher, let’s review how we arrived at this point.
It wasn’t long after DeJoy, a former Republican fundraiser and deputy RNC finance chair, became the postmaster general that he became highly controversial. He did, after all, face an FBI investigation over a campaign-finance scandal, among other ethics allegations. (DeJoy said in March that he’s been cleared in the straw-donor matter.)
DeJoy’s problematic policies haven’t been well received either: The Republican has, among other things, implemented changes intended to make some mail service “permanently slower.”
President Joe Biden does not have the legal authority to fire the postmaster general, though he probably wishes he did. Early last year, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters, “I think we can all agree — most Americans would agree — that the Postal Service needs leadership that can and will do a better job.” She added months later, “We are, of course, deeply troubled, continue to be deeply troubled, as many Americans are, by the earlier reporting on Postmaster General DeJoy’s potential financial conflicts of interest and take serious issues with the job he’s doing running the Postal Service.”
The governing board of the U.S. Postal Service has the power to remove DeJoy, and the confirmation of some Biden nominees to the board increased the odds that it might take such a step, but those efforts fell short: Ron Bloom, a Democratic Trump appointee, threw his support behind the postmaster general. Republican members on the board were in the minority, but with Bloom backing DeJoy, it didn’t matter.
So, Biden decided late last year to replace Bloom with Tangherlini, who served as the administrator of the General Services Administration during the Obama administration. The Democratic president also announced that Kan, a Republican and the former deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget, would replace Republican John Barger, an outgoing USPS board member.
Yesterday, those nominees proved so uncontroversial, that they were confirmed without opposition. It took six months, but they were confirmed easily.
Where does that leave us? The Postal Service’s governing board has nine members, but no party is permitted to have more than five members. That’s where this gets a little complicated.









