Kill the Pork

The USPS is having problems with it’s new, custom, delivery vehicle. Like they barely have any of them to replace their decrepit LLVs that are still rattling and clattering around.

A $10 billion contract awarded by the Biden administration for the production of 35,000 electric vehicles (EVs) to replace the U.S. Postal Service’s (USPS) aging fleet has produced only 250 new vehicles in more than 2 years.

Despite receiving billion of dollars in contracts and government subsidies and building a new plant, Oshkosh Defense has failed to deliver the 3,000 battery electric vehicles it promised to have produced by late 2024.

By my maths, that’s like $286K per unit. WTF are they getting?

A butt-ugly electric panel van. Although I read somewhere that it would gave a gas variant.

Ernst’s report states: “When the first vehicles were finally delivered, significant fixes were required before they were usable. Despite the delays, USPS agreed to pay higher prices for the vehicles,” the report adds, “A person involved with the production admits, ‘This is the bottom line: We don’t know how to make a damn truck.’ That’s an important detail that should have been discovered before paying the company billions to do just that!”

They have like 250 of them after two years.

Meanwhile:

Morgan Olson was able to develop its Kestrel delivery vehicle without federal subsidies and stands ready to start production at its 1-million-square-foot Danville, Virginia facility.

The proposal from Morgan Olson promises to deliver 100,000 vehicles by 2029 at a projected cost of $5.5 billion, utilizing $26 million in startup support to come in well below the estimated cost of the EV initiative.

The rollout of the Kestrel coincides with President Trump’s Executive Order 14154, which changed fleet electrification rules to address cost and practicality by targeting “burdensome and ideologically motivated regulations.”

According to the Federal Newswire, the USPS has begun field testing 5 Kestrel units and is considering a formal launch event for early 2026.

By my fingers and toes math, that’s a more realistic $55k/unit.

This is flat out pork. I want to know just whose pockets are being lined here.

How many billions deficit does USPS carry each year?

My question is: why the hell do they need a custom truck/delivery vehicle? These things are ubiquitous. Amazon has tons of Rivian vans. They look dopey as hell, but they appear to work in a fashion. Panel vans are all over and easily purchased.

The big three American, as well as Toyota and Nissan, all have delivery vehicles, and all can be had with right-hand drive. While these manufacturers are suffering, why are they spending dough to re-invent the wheel? I know why – Oshkosh (And Grumman for the LLV) are defense contractors. It doesn’t matter that they don’t actually built vehicles, per se. All it matters is that the palm-grease machinery is in place to grease the politician’s palms.

I read somewhere that they were buying Ford Transits in the meantime. Why not just do that? They’ve been delivered on time, and on budget. I see them here and there around.

Kill the thing. Get one that others are using because they already work. Out the grifting shitheads that were behind this outrage.

By the way, If memory serves, the LLV is nearly 40 years old and has miserable MPG. These hoopties should have gone the way of the dodo decades ago. I knew it was built by Grumman. I had no idea that it used a Chebbie S-10 chassis. Been a minute since I’ve seen an S-10, but given that they are otherwise simple as a butter churn, you should be able to retrofit them to a more modern engine and transmission. Take that useless electric F-150 and start there.