Members of Congress, Labor Leaders, and Postal and Clean Vehicle Advocates Gather to Deliver 432,794 Declarations Urging USPS to Update Its Fleet with Union-Made Electric Vehicles

***MEDIA ADVISORY***

Contact:

Jaime Horn

(202) 308-8810

(WASHINGTON, D.C.) – On Wednesday, April 6, 2022 at 9:30 a.m. at the east entrance of the US Postal Service Headquarters, Senator Ed Markey (D-MA), Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney (NY-12), Chairman Gerry Connolly (VA-11) and will join labor leaders, clean vehicle and climate advocates for a press conference to deliver 151,510 of petitions to the United States Postal Service (USPS) Board of Governors and 281,284 emails to Congress urging the USPS reconsider their current plan and update their nationwide fleet with electric, union-built vehicles.

Speakers will urge the USPS Board of Governors to pursue an equitable transition to clean vehicles built by well-paid union workers. A move toward electric vehicles will help mitigate the effects of climate change, reduce pollution, protect the health of postal workers and Black and Brown communities, and benefit union workers.

In 2021, the USPS awarded a multi-billion-dollar contract to Oshkosh Defense, a Wisconsin-based defense contractor that has built a wide range of military vehicles for the US military, to build its Next Generation Delivery Vehicle fleet. Though the deal was initially celebrated by Oshkosh’s UAW-organized workforce in Wisconsin, it has become clear that the new contract misses the mark both on climate and on fairness to Oshkosh’s incumbent workforce.

The Next Generation Delivery Vehicle fleet will overwhelmingly consist of inefficient and polluting internal combustion engine trucks that will be built in a newly purchased warehouse in South Carolina – a blatant move by Oshkosh to evade a decades-old contract with UAW workers in Wisconsin who are ready and eager to build the delivery vehicles of the future. A recent Inspector General report found that zero-emission electric trucks would be cheaper for the USPS over the full life cycle of the fleet – costing less to buy, fuel, and maintain than conventional fossil-fuel powered vehicles.

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