Rove hits back at Dems accusing postmaster general of sabotaging USPS: 'It is slander, it's fearmongering'

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Karl Rove defends Louis DeJoy's performance as postmaster general

Louis DeJoy has no intention of slowing the mail, says Fox News contributor Karl Rove, former deputy chief of staff to George W. Bush.

Former Obama officials and other Democrats who have accused Postmaster General Louis DeJoy of trying to suppress the vote are guilty of "slander," Fox News contributor Karl Rove charged Monday.

"Susan Rice, former national security advisor for President Obama, goes out and slanders him because she gets a picture of people removing mailboxes," Rove told "Hannity". "Well, it turns out the post office was taking old boxes and putting in new boxes."

On Friday, Rice tweeted, "WTH??" in response to a photo posted by actress Mia Farrow that purported to show a truck hauling mailboxes away in Portland, Ore. Rice also retweeted a post in which David Plouffe, also a former adviser to President Obama, referred to DeJoy as a "grifting crony" hired by Trump "to gut the USPS."

USPS FLASHBACK: OBAMA ADMINISTRATION REMOVED THOUSANDS OF MAILBOXES

"Trump's attacks on mail-in voting, inserting his grifting crony to gut the USPS, and his open threats to starve it are not political tactics," Plouffe tweeted Thursday. "They are deliberate and quite open attempts by an autocrat to hold onto power illegally. It is all on the line."

Rove defended DeJoy on Monday, saying that he had improved the performance of the USPS.

"And besides that ... the previous [Obama] administration took away 14,000 mailboxes," he added. "Poof, they disappeared, and we didn’t hear the Democrats saying that Barack Obama was trying to break the mail system or suppress voters. No, no, no, no. This is entirely politics. It is slander, it's fearmongering and it is unjustified by the facts. And shame on those Democrats."

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The USPS has clarified that it regularly replaces old boxes that are marked by graffiti, needing new paint, or rusted.

President Trump flatly denied Monday that he was asking for mail service to be delayed.

“Wouldn’t do that,” he told reporters. “I have encouraged everybody: Speed up the mail, not slow the mail.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.