Republicans have a long history of agreeing with President-elect Donald Trump’s ideas, but some are already balking at the thought of privatizing the U.S. Postal Service.
Since Trump floated privatizing USPS last week, several congressional Republicans have been quick to express concern and confusion about whether that would leave their constituencies — many of which are rural, expansive districts that rely on USPS — underserved.
Outgoing Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer told NOTUS he’s “very concerned” about what Postal Service privatization would look like for communities like his — a small Missouri town of a few hundred people.
“If you privatize it, my fear is that the rural areas are going to get short-shooted because it’s very difficult to serve them and make money,” Luetkemeyer said. “It’s going to have a really devastating effect on rural businesses and rural individuals.”
Luetkemeyer said he’s already seen the effects of USPS’ cost-cutting measures in his district’s small towns but thinks rural services would “get cut, or minimized, or both” under a private company’s control. He said if the USPS does get offered to “private folks, you’d have to have some sort of a clause to protect the rural people.”
Sen. Roger Marshall, who represents Kansas, said, “Something major has to change” at the USPS and “all options” have to be considered, but he was confused by the prospect of privatizing the independent agency.
“What does privatizing it mean? Is it, ‘We’re going to still guarantee rural delivery?’” Marshall told NOTUS. “It’s a tough, tough nut to crack.”
It’s unclear how serious Trump is about pursuing such a dramatic overhaul.
“No policy should be deemed official unless it comes from President Trump or his authorized spokespeople directly,” Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for Trump’s transition team, said in a statement to NOTUS on Friday in response to questions about Republican lawmakers’ concerns.
The Washington Post reported that Trump recently expressed interest in privatizing the agency, and Trump confirmed the report at a news conference last Monday — he told reporters it was “not the worst idea” he’s heard and that his team was “looking at it.”
The USPS did not respond to a request for comment, but a 2022 USPS Inspector General report states that 57% of post offices are in rural areas, and 81% of rural customers say the agency is “valuable.” Congress requires the agency to provide universal service to all its customers. Delivering mail to every American is an expensive undertaking — 88% of the land area the USPS serves is in rural areas, and around two-thirds of rural post offices don’t generate enough revenue to cover their costs.
Yet there’s broad bipartisan support for the services the USPS provides.
“The Postal Service is super important to a very, very, very, very rural state like ours. The Postal Service is the last-mile delivery for all of the other services, so for us, it’s really a big deal,” Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who represents Alaska, told NOTUS. “Privatization is something that’s a little concerning.”
Private companies rely on the USPS to deliver consistently to rural addresses. A 2016 USPS Inspector General report noted that while the Postal Service was facing increasing competition in getting packages to houses in urban areas, “the Postal Service might end up being the only delivery company still providing critical and affordable services to people living in the most remote areas.”
It could be hard for the government to find a private company willing to take on the task of delivering to every single address in America.
Rep. James Comer told NOTUS he doesn’t “necessarily disagree” with Trump’s idea of privatizing the Postal Service — but he’s “never found a company that wants to deliver the mail to every house in America six days a week.”
“It’s a lot to deliver the mail to every house. I’m a rural district. They have to drive miles to go to one house. It’s tough,” Comer said, pointing to private delivery services that contract with the Postal Service to do what they call last-mile delivery. It’s “because they can’t make money taking it to real, real remote places,” Comer said.
But Comer, like other Republican lawmakers, pointed to the USPS’ profit losses. It lost around $9.5 billion in 2024 despite raising the cost of stamps twice. The last time the agency didn’t see year-end losses was in 2006 when it reported generating $900 million.
“We keep spending billions and billions of dollars to clean up,” Oklahoma Rep. Kevin Hern told NOTUS. “[Postmaster Louis] DeJoy’s a private-sector guy, and what he’s found out is that there’s only so much that you can do, and it takes billions of dollars to get it done, and it’s still not profitable.”
Trump lamented the USPS’ profit losses during his first term and sought to privatize the agency before backing off the idea after a Treasury Department task force found privatization had little support from USPS stakeholders and business groups.
Several Republicans told NOTUS that they were holding off on making assumptions about how privatization would affect their constituents until they see specific plans.
“The best thing for me to say is, let’s see the proposal. I do think government can work better,” Sen. Bill Cassidy said.
North Carolina Rep. Chuck Edwards said he’d also like to hear more, but that he’s generally open to privatization.
“I’ve not looked closely enough into privatization yet to be able to render an educated opinion. I can say that I have seen few things that the government could do better than the private sector,” Edwards told NOTUS.
Despite their rural constituencies, some Republicans on the hill welcomed the possibility of a private takeover — as long as the government could find someone interested in taking it on. Outgoing Sen. Mitt Romney, who represents Utah, told NOTUS that privatization “wouldn’t be a disaster.”
“I am sure that there would be a private equity player out there that would think there’s an opportunity, and I think it’s very unlikely to occur, but not impossible,” Romney said. “Private equity has a way of making things work that were otherwise broken.”
Rep. Mike Collins, who represents a rural Georgia district, told NOTUS that the Postal Service is vital for small businesses in his district and thought privatization could be a solution.
“They depend on the post office to run smooth, and it has not run smooth in a long time,” Collins said. “I’m a big proponent of free market. If there is a way to privatize and get the federal government out of your life, then certainly, I’ll take a look at all of it.”
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Emily Kennard is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.