S. 5163 would ban bonuses for the Postmaster General and Deputy Postmaster General in any year that the U.S. Postal Service fails to hit a 95% on-time delivery standard across all mail categories — a bar USPS has not come close to clearing recently.
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What It Does
S. 5163 amends Title 39 of the United States Code — the statutory foundation of the U.S. Postal Service — to add a restriction on executive compensation. Specifically, it directs the USPS Board of Governors not to approve any bonus, award, or monetary compensation beyond basic pay for the Postmaster General or Deputy Postmaster General for any fiscal year in which the Postal Service does not meet or exceed a 95% on-time delivery performance rate for each on-time delivery target set for a market-dominant product category. Market-dominant products are those where USPS has a legally protected monopoly — primarily First-Class Mail (letters, postcards, flats), Marketing Mail (bulk advertising), Periodicals (magazines, newspapers), and related services. The 95% threshold must be met across every one of these categories, not just an average; missing even one product category triggers the ban for that year. The bill does not retroactively claw back bonuses already paid, does not alter the Postmaster General's base salary, and does not create new penalties for the Board if it disregards the prohibition.
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The Real Story
The real fight is about accountability at a monopoly quasi-government agency that has posted roughly $25 billion in net losses over three fiscal years — including a $9 billion loss in FY2025 — while simultaneously raising postage rates and awarding its leadership millions in bonuses. Hawley and his Democratic co-sponsor Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) want to strip the USPS Board of Governors of its unfettered discretion over executive pay by linking bonuses to a hard delivery metric. The Board of Governors, which is the body that *approves* those bonuses, has so far defended the pay as necessary for competitive talent recruitment. The underlying tension is whether performance-based pay should be available to leaders of a government-backed institution that is simultaneously failing its core mission and losing billions annually — or whether the very concept of "performance bonus" is inappropriate until basic service is restored.
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Who Benefits
- Rural and low-income Americans who depend on USPS for prescription medications, government checks, legal notices, and ballots. These populations have no realistic alternative to mail service and bear the brunt of delivery failures, particularly in states like Missouri where documented backlogs have been severe.
- Small businesses, particularly in rural markets, that cannot absorb the cost of switching to private carriers like FedEx or UPS and lose revenue when invoices, payments, and merchandise are delayed.
- Members of Congress in high-complaint states who can point to concrete legislative action on mail delivery without committing to the heavier lift of postal structural reform.
- Private parcel carriers (FedEx, UPS, Amazon Logistics) benefit indirectly from continued USPS dysfunction that drives volume to commercial alternatives — though the bill doesn't change that dynamic directly.
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Who Gets Hurt
- Postmaster General David Steiner and the Deputy Postmaster General directly — they are the only named targets. Steiner's first-year total compensation exceeded $520,000 including a relocation bonus worth 50% of his $346,780 salary; the portion at risk under this bill is the performance bonus component.
- The USPS Board of Governors loses discretion over executive compensation that it currently holds entirely. Board members who argue competitive pay is necessary to attract qualified executive talent from the private sector would see that argument overridden by statute.
- Future leadership recruitment could theoretically be complicated if the compensation floor becomes less flexible — though this argument cuts both ways, since anyone accepting the PMG job presumably knows USPS's delivery record going in.
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Red Flags
- The 95% threshold per product category is extremely strict by design — and functions more as a permanent ban than a conditional one. Given that USPS failed 20 of 27 market-dominant product delivery targets in FY2025 even after lowering most of them, the bill would have blocked bonuses entirely last year. There is no ramp-up period or partial compliance provision — it's all-or-nothing for each product category.
- The bill covers only two positions: Postmaster General and Deputy Postmaster General. The entire rest of USPS leadership — other C-suite officers, vice presidents, and regional executives — remains eligible for bonuses regardless of service performance. If the intent is to fix accountability culture, the bill leaves most of the organization untouched.
- No enforcement mechanism beyond the Board of Governors itself. The bill directs the Board not to approve bonuses, but the Board is the same body that approved the bonuses currently under scrutiny. The bill does not specify what happens — penalty, clawback, or public reporting requirement — if the Board approves compensation anyway.
- "Market-dominant product" classification is a technical term defined by postal law and the PRC. The PRC can reclassify products between competitive and market-dominant categories, which could theoretically shift what the 95% standard applies to. The bill does not appear to lock this definition.
- The bill does not address the Board of Governors' own compensation or its process for setting PMG pay, which critics (including some postal reform advocates) argue is the structural problem rather than the bonus amount itself.
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Hidden Riders
- None identified. The bill is unusually narrow — it does one specific thing (restricts bonus approval authority) for two specific positions (PMG and Deputy PMG) based on one specific metric (95% per-product on-time delivery). There are no appropriations riders, no unrelated agency provisions, and no funding mechanism buried in the text based on available sources.
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Current Status
S. 5163 was introduced on July 29, 2026 (119th Congress, 2nd Session) and has been read twice and formally referred to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. This is the earliest active stage of the Senate legislative process — the bill exists on paper and has been assigned but has not yet received a committee hearing, a markup session, or any floor action. There has been no Senate vote of any kind. The bill was introduced with bipartisan support from two senators (Hawley and Blumenthal), which is notable but does not guarantee committee action. In plain terms: the bill has been filed and sent to committee, where most bills stall permanently unless the committee chair schedules it for consideration.
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Sources:
- [Hawley, Blumenthal Introduce Legislation to Ban Bonuses for Postal Service Leadership — Josh Hawley Senate Office](https://www.hawley.senate.gov/hawley-blumenthal-introduce-legislation-to-ban-bonuses-for-postal-service-leadership-until-mail-is-delivered-on-time/)
- [US SB5163 — LegiScan (119th Congress)](https://legiscan.com/US/bill/SB5163/2025?guid=psVjGl9ddcuDfjDD2ivWz)
- [S. 5163 Full Text — GovInfo.gov](https://www.govinfo.gov/bulkdata/BILLS/119/2/s/BILLS-119s5163is.xml)
- [Hawley Launches Investigation into USPS Failures — Josh Hawley Senate Office](https://www.hawley.senate.gov/hawley-launches-investigation-into-failures-at-us-postal-service-after-postmaster-general-refused-to-forego-bonuses/)
- [EXCLUSIVE: Hawley to Introduce Bill Blocking USPS Executive Bonuses — Yahoo News / Fox News](https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/exclusive-hawley-introduce-bill-blocking-192455236.html)
- [USPS FY2025 Annual Compliance Determination Report — Postal Regulatory Commission (March 27, 2026)](https://www.prc.gov/sites/default/files/reports/Annual%20Compliance%20determination.pdf)
- [USPS Sees $9 Billion Net Loss in FY 2025 — Federal News Network](https://federalnewsnetwork.com/agency-oversight/2025/11/usps-sees-9-billion-net-loss-in-fy-2025-renews-push-to-borrow-more-from-treasury/)
- [USPS Lowers On-Time Delivery Targets for 2025 — SupplyChainBrain](https://www.supplychainbrain.com/articles/40832-usps-lowers-on-time-delivery-targets-for-2025)
- [Postal Service Board Appoints David Steiner as 76th PMG — USPS Newsroom](https://about.usps.com/newsroom/national-releases/2025/0509-usps-bog-appoints-david-steiner-to-be-76th-pmg-and-ceo-of-usps.htm)
- [Rep. Strong Introduces PERFORM Act — Postal Employee Network](https://postalemployeenetwork.com/news/2026/07/25/alabama-congressman-dale-strong-introduces-bill-to-hold-usps-accountable-tying-postmaster-general-pay-to-performance/)
- [Hawley Bill Would Ban USPS Leadership Bonuses — Edina Sentinel / regional coverage](https://www.edinasentinel.com/2026/07/29/hawley-bill-would-ban-usps-leadership-bonuses/)
S. 5163 would ban bonuses for the Postmaster General and Deputy Postmaster General in any year that the U.S. Postal Service fails to hit a 95% on-time delivery standard across all mail categories — a bar USPS has not come close to clearing recently.
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Why now
The immediate trigger was a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing in summer 2026 where Sen. Josh Hawley confronted Postmaster General David Steiner — who took office July 15, 2025 and is the highest-paid chief executive in USPS history — over accepting large bonuses while Missouri constituents suffered documented mail failures. When Steiner refused to voluntarily return the bonus, Hawley launched a formal congressional investigation. That investigation surfaced a specific incident on April 29, 2026, when thousands of pieces of undelivered mail were found dumped in a vacant lot in North St. Louis, and federal audits confirmed millions of delayed pieces at the St. Louis Processing and Distribution Center. The backdrop is a March 2026 Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) Annual Compliance Determination report finding that 20 of 27 market-dominant mail products failed to meet their own FY2025 service targets — and USPS had already *lowered* 19 of those targets going into the year.
---
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The real story
The real fight is about accountability at a monopoly quasi-government agency that has posted roughly $25 billion in net losses over three fiscal years — including a $9 billion loss in FY2025 — while simultaneously raising postage rates and awarding its leadership millions in bonuses. Hawley and his Democratic co-sponsor Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) want to strip the USPS Board of Governors of its unfettered discretion over executive pay by linking bonuses to a hard delivery metric. The Board of Governors, which is the body that *approves* those bonuses, has so far defended the pay as necessary for competitive talent recruitment. The underlying tension is whether performance-based pay should be available to leaders of a government-backed institution that is simultaneously failing its core mission and losing billions annually — or whether the very concept of "performance bonus" is inappropriate until basic service is restored.
---
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Red flags
▸ The 95% threshold per product category is extremely strict by design — and functions more as a permanent ban than a conditional one. Given that USPS failed 20 of 27 market-dominant product delivery targets in FY2025 even after lowering most of them, the bill would have blocked bonuses entirely last year. There is no ramp-up period or partial compliance provision — it's all-or-nothing for each product category.
▸ The bill covers only two positions: Postmaster General and Deputy Postmaster General. The entire rest of USPS leadership — other C-suite officers, vice presidents, and regional executives — remains eligible for bonuses regardless of service performance. If the intent is to fix accountability culture, the bill leaves most of the organization untouched.
▸ No enforcement mechanism beyond the Board of Governors itself. The bill directs the Board not to approve bonuses, but the Board is the same body that approved the bonuses currently under scrutiny. The bill does not specify what happens — penalty, clawback, or public reporting requirement — if the Board approves compensation anyway.
▸ "Market-dominant product" classification is a technical term defined by postal law and the PRC. The PRC can reclassify products between competitive and market-dominant categories, which could theoretically shift what the 95% standard applies to. The bill does not appear to lock this definition.
▸ The bill does not address the Board of Governors' own compensation or its process for setting PMG pay, which critics (including some postal reform advocates) argue is the structural problem rather than the bonus amount itself.
▸ --
Who benefits
• Rural and low-income Americans who depend on USPS for prescription medications, government checks, legal notices, and ballots. These populations have no realistic alternative to mail service and bear the brunt of delivery failures, particularly in states like Missouri where documented backlogs have been severe.
• Small businesses, particularly in rural markets, that cannot absorb the cost of switching to private carriers like FedEx or UPS and lose revenue when invoices, payments, and merchandise are delayed.
• Members of Congress in high-complaint states who can point to concrete legislative action on mail delivery without committing to the heavier lift of postal structural reform.
• Private parcel carriers (FedEx, UPS, Amazon Logistics) benefit indirectly from continued USPS dysfunction that drives volume to commercial alternatives — though the bill doesn't change that dynamic directly.
• --
Who gets hurt
• Postmaster General David Steiner and the Deputy Postmaster General directly — they are the only named targets. Steiner's first-year total compensation exceeded $520,000 including a relocation bonus worth 50% of his $346,780 salary; the portion at risk under this bill is the performance bonus component.
• The USPS Board of Governors loses discretion over executive compensation that it currently holds entirely. Board members who argue competitive pay is necessary to attract qualified executive talent from the private sector would see that argument overridden by statute.
• Future leadership recruitment could theoretically be complicated if the compensation floor becomes less flexible — though this argument cuts both ways, since anyone accepting the PMG job presumably knows USPS's delivery record going in.
• --
What it does
S. 5163 amends Title 39 of the United States Code — the statutory foundation of the U.S. Postal Service — to add a restriction on executive compensation. Specifically, it directs the USPS Board of Governors not to approve any bonus, award, or monetary compensation beyond basic pay for the Postmaster General or Deputy Postmaster General for any fiscal year in which the Postal Service does not meet or exceed a 95% on-time delivery performance rate for each on-time delivery target set for a market-dominant product category. Market-dominant products are those where USPS has a legally protected monopoly — primarily First-Class Mail (letters, postcards, flats), Marketing Mail (bulk advertising), Periodicals (magazines, newspapers), and related services. The 95% threshold must be met across every one of these categories, not just an average; missing even one product category triggers the ban for that year. The bill does not retroactively claw back bonuses already paid, does not alter the Postmaster General's base salary, and does not create new penalties for the Board if it disregards the prohibition.
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Precedent
Congress has attempted to restrict bonuses at poorly performing federal agencies before — the *Stop Wasteful Federal Bonuses Act* (S. 742, 114th Congress, 2015) and the *Stop Improper Federal Bonuses Act* (S. 2119, 116th Congress, 2019) both tried to tighten bonus rules for federal employees at agencies with oversight problems, and neither became law. The stronger parallel may be the public outrage over Veterans Affairs executive bonuses during the 2014 VA wait-time scandal, which did produce passed legislation (the Veterans Access, Choice and Accountability Act of 2014) including compensation accountability provisions — suggesting that a sufficiently sharp public narrative around a specific agency's failures can move these bills. What's different this time is the bipartisan structure (a Republican from Missouri and a Democrat from Connecticut co-sponsoring), a parallel House bill (Rep. Dale Strong's PERFORM Act), and a documented, recent physical incident — the dumped mail — that gives the legislation a concrete news hook.
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Current status
S. 5163 was introduced on July 29, 2026 (119th Congress, 2nd Session) and has been read twice and formally referred to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. This is the earliest active stage of the Senate legislative process — the bill exists on paper and has been assigned but has not yet received a committee hearing, a markup session, or any floor action. There has been no Senate vote of any kind. The bill was introduced with bipartisan support from two senators (Hawley and Blumenthal), which is notable but does not guarantee committee action. In plain terms: the bill has been filed and sent to committee, where most bills stall permanently unless the committee chair schedules it for consideration.
---
Sources:
- [Hawley, Blumenthal Introduce Legislation to Ban Bonuses for Postal Service Leadership — Josh Hawley Senate Office](https://www.hawley.senate.gov/hawley-blumenthal-introduce-legislation-to-ban-bonuses-for-postal-service-leadership-until-mail-is-delivered-on-time/)
- [US SB5163 — LegiScan (119th Congress)](https://legiscan.com/US/bill/SB5163/2025?guid=psVjGl9ddcuDfjDD2ivWz)
- [S. 5163 Full Text — GovInfo.gov](https://www.govinfo.gov/bulkdata/BILLS/119/2/s/BILLS-119s5163is.xml)
- [Hawley Launches Investigation into USPS Failures — Josh Hawley Senate Office](https://www.hawley.senate.gov/hawley-launches-investigation-into-failures-at-us-postal-service-after-postmaster-general-refused-to-forego-bonuses/)
- [EXCLUSIVE: Hawley to Introduce Bill Blocking USPS Executive Bonuses — Yahoo News / Fox News](https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/exclusive-hawley-introduce-bill-blocking-192455236.html)
- [USPS FY2025 Annual Compliance Determination Report — Postal Regulatory Commission (March 27, 2026)](https://www.prc.gov/sites/default/files/reports/Annual%20Compliance%20determination.pdf)
- [USPS Sees $9 Billion Net Loss in FY 2025 — Federal News Network](https://federalnewsnetwork.com/agency-oversight/2025/11/usps-sees-9-billion-net-loss-in-fy-2025-renews-push-to-borrow-more-from-treasury/)
- [USPS Lowers On-Time Delivery Targets for 2025 — SupplyChainBrain](https://www.supplychainbrain.com/articles/40832-usps-lowers-on-time-delivery-targets-for-2025)
- [Postal Service Board Appoints David Steiner as 76th PMG — USPS Newsroom](https://about.usps.com/newsroom/national-releases/2025/0509-usps-bog-appoints-david-steiner-to-be-76th-pmg-and-ceo-of-usps.htm)
- [Rep. Strong Introduces PERFORM Act — Postal Employee Network](https://postalemployeenetwork.com/news/2026/07/25/alabama-congressman-dale-strong-introduces-bill-to-hold-usps-accountable-tying-postmaster-general-pay-to-performance/)
- [Hawley Bill Would Ban USPS Leadership Bonuses — Edina Sentinel / regional coverage](https://www.edinasentinel.com/2026/07/29/hawley-bill-would-ban-usps-leadership-bonuses/)
What to watch
The bill was referred to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, which means it must clear that committee before any floor vote — and the committee's chairman controls whether it gets a hearing. Watch for whether the committee schedules a markup, which would be the first real test of momentum beyond the press release stage. A meaningful lever for citizens is constituent mail and phone calls to senators on that committee, since postal service failures are a local issue in every state. The companion House PERFORM Act (broader in scope, covering financial performance too) may compete with or complement S. 5163's path — if one advances faster, it could become the vehicle.
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