The White House’s big lie about not touching Social Security
Despite claims by the White House that it won’t cut Social Security, the administration is already beginning to attack and dismantle the program that Americans have paid into throughout their careers.
Why are they doing this? To hand out trillions in tax cuts to billionaires.
In fact, Social Security is already under attack.
Here’s a short timeline of the assault on Social Security.
- In early March, Elon Musk, an unelected White House adviser who’s recklessly slashing the entire federal workforce, called Social Security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.”
- Musk alleged Social Security is a hotbed of fraud and abuse (in reality, Social Security has a 99.7% payment accuracy rate) and said in an interview that so-called entitlement programs are the “big one to eliminate.” (Tell that to the millions of Americans for whom Social Security is the only thing keeping them afloat.)
- The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which Musk leads, unlawfully accessed millions of Americans’ Social Security data. AFSCME fought back in court and won a temporary restraining order forcing DOGE to delete your data and cut their access.
- In response to the federal judge’s ruling, the acting commissioner of Social Security threatened to shut the entire agency down, displaying a total lack of regard for the people it serves. After the both the judge and AFSCME blasted him for making such a threat, the administration walked it back.
- At the White House’s direction, hasty service cuts are already taking place, which will increase the likelihood of fraud.
- Staffing at the Social Security Administration is at a 50-year low, but the administration is still planning to cut its workforce by 7,000 workers, even as they have shut down 6 of 10 regional offices. A highly efficient agency is being stripped to the bone.
- And even more service cutbacks make Social Security harder to access by phone. This deals a blow to people who cannot easily go to in-person facilities or who lack internet access, like rural Americans and many senior citizens.
So, don’t believe the administration when it says it won’t touch Social Security. It already has and it’s only going to get worse.
But there’s good news.
AFSCME members are fighting back. We won’t let this administration destroy Social Security or the retirement security the program provides to millions of Americans.