Fact check: New postmaster general invested in Postal Service competitors

Chelsey Cox, USA TODAY
·9 min read

The claim: Postmaster General Louis DeJoy has $70 million invested in companies that compete with the United States Postal Service

President Donald Trump appointed a new postmaster general for the U.S. Postal Service in May, and this summer his pick has come under criticism on social media.

"New (Republican) businessman Postmaster General Louis DeJoy has $70m invested in companies that compete w/the Postal Service," Facebook user Florence Vincent wrote in a post on July 27. She told USA TODAY that her post was based on a few stories she found.

The claim found its way to Twitter this month. User @CarolynYoung64 posted a meme on Aug. 3 with a picture of DeJoy "wearing" a badge that reads "Other98." Next to the picture is a statement about DeJoy's investments. The Other 98 is a progressive social media organization that creates meme content primarily for Facebook, according to its website.

"Trump's Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and his wife have between $30.1 million and $75.3 million in assets in U.S. Postal Service competitors and contractors," reads the meme's statement. "The man Trump put in charge of OUR Postal Service has the most to gain from its destruction."

The tweet tagged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.; and Reps. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.; and Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., with a request to "Please subpoena & stop DeJoy NOW."

USA TODAY reached out to Young for comment.

Changes at the top of USPS

Leadership of the Postal Service has been reshaped with mostly Trump appointees. Its board of governors appointed North Carolina businessman and Trump campaign donor Louis DeJoy to the helm after U.S. Postal Service career veteran Megan Brennan retired earlier this year.

DeJoy began his new role in June during a time of financial hardship for the Postal Service. Postal officials told Congress in April that the service could run out of money by the end of September in part because of COVID-19, according to USA TODAY.

The claim about DeJoy's investments picked up speed amid reports that his restructuring of the Postal Service's priorities led to processing delays. Some view the changes as a political maneuver to undermine a projected ramp-up in voting by mail amid the COVID-19 pandemic, The Washington Post reported.

However, this theory was partially debunked by USA TODAY. In a report, White House deputy press secretary Sarah Matthews called it "baseless and absurd," while Postal Service spokesperson Marti Johnson said the agency is "fully committed to fulfilling our role in the electoral process."

Fact check: Voters should request ballots 2 weeks early, but mail isn't intentionally slow

Two insiders also offered a different perspective on the Postal Service's capacity to deliver election ballots on time. David Williams, chief logistics and processing operations officer and executive vice president of the U.S. Postal Service and Thomas Marshall, general counsel and executive vice president, said the agency is well-prepared.

"Contrary to media accounts and other accusations, there have been no edicts to delay the mail or eliminate overtime," Marshall and Williams wrote in an opinion piece in USA TODAY on Aug. 12. "Rather, we are ensuring that our operations run on time and on schedule, which will avoid unnecessary overtime and transportation costs. We are making these changes methodically and in ways designed to ensure the timely and cost-effective delivery of America’s mail – including election mail."

Marshall and Williams also warned election officials and voters to be mindful of the Postal Service's delivery standards.

Opinion: U.S. Postal Service remains committed to fulfilling our role in the electoral process

How is DeJoy tied to Trump?

In the 2016 campaign, DeJoy donated more than $440,000 to the Trump Victory Fund, the inaugural committee and the Republican National Committee, according to the Raleigh News & Observer.

DeJoy is a "longtime donor of Republican causes," according to The Washington Post. Federal Election Commission records showed more than $157,000 in donations to Republican candidates, committees and super PACS from the start of 2020 until May, when the Post published its report.

The Charlotte 2020 Host Committee nominated DeJoy as its national finance chair for the 2020 Republican National Convention. A private convention will be held in Charlotte on Aug. 21-24, according to The Associated Press.

Prior to leading USPS, DeJoy served as CEO and chairman of New Breed Logistics, a company based in High Point, North Carolina, that provided logistics support services to corporations like Verizon, Disney and Boeing. The company also had a 25-year working relationship with the U.S. Postal Service, supplying multiple mail processing facilities with logistics support, the Greensboro News & Record has reported.

DeJoy sold New Breed Logistics to shipping company XPO Logistics in 2014 for $615 million, according to Business North Carolina. He served on the company's board until 2018, before becoming president of LDJ Global Strategies, a Greensboro real estate investment and consulting company, according to the News & Record.

Trump nominated DeJoy's wife, Aldona Wos, as ambassador to Canada in February. She has served as the vice chair of President's Commission on White House Fellowships since 2017, according to a nominee report from the U.S. Office of Government Ethics. Wos was also ambassador to Estonia in the George W. Bush Administration in 2004, the New York Times reported. And she served as North Carolina's secretary of Health and Human Services from 2013-15, under Gov. Pat McCrory.

Does DeJoy really have investments in U.S. Postal Service competitors?

The Washington Post reported in June about a probe into DeJoy's selection as postmaster general. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., asked the Postal Service governing board to turn over communications with the White House about the interview process and DeJoy's ultimate appointment.

Schumer also sought the board's assurance that DeJoy would relinquish any conflicting financial holdings.

"(DeJoy's) financial interests in companies that have business ties with the Postal Service, as well as his extensive campaign fundraising efforts, also raise concerns regarding whether and how legal prohibitions on his ethical conflicts of interest and partisan political activity as a federal employee will be addressed," Schumer wrote to Postal Service Board of Governors Chairman Robert Duncan in a letter.

USA TODAY confirmed DeJoy's assets and vested restricted stock units in the company are valued between $250,001-$500,000, according to Wos' nominee report.

DeJoy is also listed as having received director fees and income from XPO Logistics, a U.S. Postal Service contractor, but an income amount is not provided.

Wos' assets from UPS Inc. and freight shipping company J.B. Hunt total between $116,003-$315,000. Her own assets from XPO Logistics are valued between $30 million-$75 million.

Together, DeJoy and Wos may claim up to a total $75,815,000 in assets from U.S. Postal Service competitors, according to government records.

USA TODAY has reached out to Wos for comment.

As postmaster general, DeJoy had to file a report with the Office of Government Ethics within 30 days of his appointment and then annually, as well as file periodic public transaction reports for qualifying transactions. He is also required to divest from any assets presenting a conflict of interest with the agency's operations, according to an email from spokesman Dave Partenheimer.

"The Postal Service does not require the Postmaster General to divest any particular assets. Rather, the Postmaster General may be required to divest an asset if a conflict of interest arises, and the Postal Service determines that his participation in the matter is so crucial that he may not disqualify himself," Partenheimer told USA TODAY.

A government ethics expert also told USA TODAY that divestment from Postal Service competitors is not a requirement.

"The postmaster general is not required to divest of all of his assets in these kinds of investments. However, he needs to steer clear of decisions that would materially benefit the companies he is invested in. He should recuse himself from such decisions if it even comes close to that line,” Peter Schweizer, president of the Government Accountability Institute said in an email.

DeJoy has committed to compliance with Postal Service regulations, according to a statement from Partenheimer.

“I take my ethical obligations seriously, and I have done what is necessary to ensure that I am and will remain in compliance with those obligations,” DeJoy stated.

Our rating: Missing Context

We rate this claim as MISSING CONTEXT, based on our research. Louis DeJoy and his wife Aldona Wos reported between at least $30 million to just over $75 million in assets from XPO Logistics, J.B. Hunt and UPS. All are competitors with U.S. Postal Service operations. While government records confirm their ownership of the assets, the exact value of the holdings is not clear from the records.

Our fact-check sources:

The Associated Press contributed to this report

Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here.

Our fact check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fact check: Postmaster general Louis DeJoy invested in competitors