Signed, Sealed, Deported: USPS Ramps Up Efforts to Assist Trump Administration With Deportations

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night will stop the Trump administration from tracking down and deporting illegals. And they're reportedly using all means necessary, including the United States Postal Service (USPS), to identify those who are on American soil illegally.

According to a rather disapproving report by the Washington Post, the USPS's storied Postal Inspection Service (USPIS) has joined forces with the mass deportation efforts of President Trump and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The USPIS is now apparently playing a major role in the intragovernmental DHS task force that is responsible for finding, detaining, and deporting illegals. The move makes a ton of sense as no other governmental or quasi governmental agency has more frequent contact with the public than does the USPS.

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There are limits to what the USPIS can do to surveil its customers, but one way they are assisting with the administration's deportation efforts is via their "mail covers" program. This program gives postal investigators broad powers to photograph the outside of letters and packages that are moving through the postal system. The USPIS can also share information with DHS officials that is collected through online accounts, mail-tracking systems, credit card transactions and IP addresses.

This isn't the first time the USPIS has collaborated with the federal government in carrying out federal law enforcement efforts. As RedState reported last summer, the USPIS has also used its "mail covers" program to assist the National Security Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigations, and the Central Intelligence Agency in investigating certain crimes. This revelation rankled a bunch of U.S. Senators, who wrote a letter to Chief Postal Inspector Gary R. Barksdale that shed some light on the mysterious "mail covers" program:

Under one type of mail surveillance, known as "mail covers," requesting agencies are provided with sender and recipient information for letters and parcels sent to or from a particular target that are delivered by USPS. USPIS coordinates these requests from law enforcement and intelligence agencies, and delivers the list of targets to USPS, which then conducts the surveillance.

Barksdale, in response, denied the USPIS was a “large-scale surveillance apparatus” and maintained the agency focused only on mail that could assist in locating criminals and identifying possible threats to national security. He noted that practice had been in operation since 1879, stating, “There is no reasonable expectation of privacy with respect to information contained on the outside of mail matter.”

The USPS may be playing nice with Trump in an effort to stave off any plans the administration may have for assuming control of the agency that, while technically independent, is technically part of the executive branch. President Trump has previously floated the idea of merging the postal service with the Department of Commerce, which may be why the USPIS reportedly told employees of its cooperation with deportation efforts: “We want to play well in the sandbox."

There's bound to be extra scrutiny placed on the USPIS and its "mail covers" program now that it's being utilized by the Trump administration to track down and deport illegals. It will be interesting to see if those who balked at the program being used to surveil American citizens will keep that same skepticism now that it's targeting illegals. We've grown all too used to a certain party prioritizing the "rights" of illegals over the safety and well-being of actual Americans.

Thanks to President Trump, illegal immigration into our great country has virtually stopped. Despite the radical left's lies, new legislation wasn't needed to secure our border, just a new president.

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