In a letter to Congress, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said the USPS would use a voluntary early retirement program to trim 10,000 jobs over the next 30 days.
The Postal Service employs around 635,000 individuals. The cuts over the coming weeks would represent a roughly 1.6% reduction in headcount. In the letter, DeJoy says that DOGE will work with the USPS as part of broader cost-cutting measures.
“Fixing a broken organization that had experienced close to $100 billion in losses and was projected to lose another $200 billion, without a bankruptcy proceeding, is a daunting task,” DeJoy said in the letter dated March 13, per Fox News.
“Fixing a heavily legislated and overly regulated organization as massive, important, cherished, misunderstood and debated as the United States Postal Service, with such a broken business model, is even more difficult.”
DOGE will help the organization identify inefficiencies. The letter outlines issues like the mismanagement of the agency’s retirement assets.
DeJoy called the USPS’ efforts “a lifeline to our organization,” which, should Congress act, would enable the organization to operate sustainably into the future.
“I ask that you please engage with the Postal Service, our DOGE representatives, and the Federal agencies that need to adapt to the critically necessary changes involved and to correct for the deficiencies of the past that can and must be corrected,” the letter continued.