Republicans have taken a stand against the Biden administration’s push for electric vehicles, particularly when it comes to the U.S. Postal Service’s (USPS) costly electric mail truck initiative. A new bill introduced by members of the DOGE Caucus, including Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) and Representative Michael Cloud (R-TX), aims to put an end to the $3 billion USPS electric vehicle (EV) program, calling it a textbook example of government waste. The bill, humorously titled the “Return to Sender Act,” was introduced on March 10, 2025.
The controversial program, part of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), was initially promoted as a way to create jobs and improve the efficiency of mail delivery by converting the USPS fleet to electric trucks. However, what was sold as a promising step toward environmental sustainability and modernization has instead been plagued by delays, rising costs, and questionable results. Critics, like Ernst and Cloud, argue that the program is little more than a waste of taxpayer dollars.
“The Biden administration’s EV postal fleet is lost in the mail,” Senator Ernst remarked, speaking to Fox News Digital. “The order needs to be canceled, and the unspent money should be returned to sender—the taxpayers. I’m pushing to defund this billion-dollar boondoggle to stamp out waste in Washington. Taxpayer money should always be treated with first-class priority.”
Rep. Michael Cloud also weighed in, calling out the USPS’s lack of transparency and the project’s repeated failures. “This law funneled billions into a failed USPS EV project that has delivered nothing but delays, defective trucks, and skyrocketing costs,” Cloud said. “Three years later, taxpayers are still waiting while the Postal Service refuses to provide basic transparency on where the money went.”
The EV postal program, which was supposed to be a flagship initiative to modernize the postal fleet, has been riddled with problems since its inception. Oshkosh, the defense contractor tasked with producing the “Next Generation Delivery Vehicles” (NGDVs), has fallen far behind schedule. Despite receiving billions in taxpayer funding, the company has failed to deliver the promised trucks on time. Initially, the USPS planned to order 60,000 trucks, but as of November 2024, only 93 had been delivered—far from the 3,000 that should have been built by that point.
Adding insult to injury, the Postal Service agreed to pay more for each truck after Oshkosh raised the price. Under the new contract, the cost of each NGDV ballooned to a staggering $77,692 per unit. With such astronomical costs and so few trucks delivered, the program has quickly become a symbol of wasteful government spending.
Despite the mounting evidence of failure, USPS spokesperson Kim Frum attempted to defend the program, citing the environmental benefits of electric vehicles. “From the start, USPS committed to purchasing the most environmentally sustainable vehicles across the organization’s entire fleet, consistent with financial and operational considerations,” she said. However, such statements ring hollow when weighed against the fact that the program is woefully behind schedule and over budget.
Meanwhile, John Pfeifer, CEO of Oshkosh, has remained upbeat about the project, telling investors that he was “really happy where we are.” However, behind the scenes, workers on the production team have expressed frustration with the ongoing issues. “This is the bottom line: We don’t know how to make a damn truck,” said one anonymous source, highlighting the dysfunction plaguing the program.
As lawmakers continue to push for a return to fiscal responsibility, the “Return to Sender Act” seeks to ensure that taxpayer money is spent wisely and that government programs are held accountable for their failures. With mounting evidence of inefficiency and waste, it’s clear that the push for electric vehicles at the USPS is anything but a success.
