The Struggle Always Continues

As the dust settles on the start of the 119th Congress, your Legislative and Political Department is hard at work fostering relationships with the new and returning members of Congress. While there are many issues we track, and legislative priorities we advocate for, it is first important to note specific attacks on postal workers.

Potential Attacks on Postal Workers

There are several proposals for federal cost-savings that the APWU is firmly against, some of which were discussed during President Trump’s first term, including:

• Raising the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) contribution rate;
• Reducing or fully eliminating cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs);
• Eliminating FERS supplemental retirement payments;
• Reducing annuity calculations, basing it on the highest five years of pay (High-5) instead of the highest three (High-3);
• Increasing Federal Employees Health Bene ts (FEHB) contributions.

We will continue to carefully watch for potential attacks on the hard-earned benefits of APWU members and retirees during the upcoming congressional budget process.

Recent Executive Actions

Two executive actions taken in January impact our fellow federal workers. First, a hiring freeze was placed on federal civilian employees, with limited exceptions. The executive action goes on to request a formal plan to reduce the size of the federal workforce. Second, President Trump reinstated Executive Order 13957 from Oct. 2020, which created Schedule F – now renamed Schedule Policy/Career. This is a reclassification of federal employees with “policy-influencing positions” as political appointees. In short, Schedule Policy/Career allows the president to appoint his supporters to key government positions, while removing qualified, merit-based hires.

While these two actions do not directly impact postal workers, we must pay close attention to any changes to the federal workforce and be prepared, when called upon, to help our federal union siblings fight back.

The Department of Government Efficiency

The newly established Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was created by an executive order signed on Jan. 20, 2025. Recently, lawmakers and news organizations have discussed how to make the Postal Service more “efficient.” Ideas include downsizing the entire Postal Service, embracing Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology with robots replacing employee work, revoking the $3 billion Congress granted to the Postal Service for the new electric vehicle fleet, and replacing the current retirement plan with a defined contribution plan for new hires – drastically reducing retirement bene ts and eliminating the retirement security we have all fought to preserve. Another idea attempts to reduce the total number of career employees and have postal workers cover multiple tasks in various crafts.

Committees to Watch

There are two committees of note with jurisdiction over the Postal Service. In the Senate, the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC) is tasked with, in part, the responsibility to, “study the efficiency, economy, and effectiveness of all agencies and departments of the federal government.” In the House, the Oversight and Government Reform Committee maintains jurisdiction over the Postal Service and will soon be tasked by Republican House leadership with finding areas of government spending to cut.

Please click here to see if your member of Congress is a member of either crucial committee. We encourage all APWU members to remain vigilant of these and any future attacks on postal workers, especially our hard-earned benefi ts. It is important that we, as postal workers and retirees, defend the work we do to serve the public. Please visit our website at apwu.org/legislative to view information about our current fi ghts and talking points for our legislative priorities.■