The acting head of the Social Security Administration (SSA) left the agency after she refused to give billionaire Elon Musk and the so-called ”department of government efficiency” (Doge) access to sensitive information about beneficiaries.
The SSA processes retirement and disability benefits for more than 71 million Americans – and it uses sensitive personal information, such as banking information and tax information, to do so.
Michelle King, who had worked at the agency for 30 years, chose to retire rather than grant the request. She will be replaced by Leland Dudek, who works at the agency.
Her departure is one of several high-ranking officials who chose to leave their roles rather than provide Doge access to sensitive information. Doge also accessed highly sensitive information at the treasury department and is attempting to access the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
“President Trump has nominated the highly qualified and talented Frank Bisignano to lead the Social Security Administration, and we expect him to be swiftly confirmed in the coming weeks,” the White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said in a statement released on Monday.
“In the meantime, the agency will be led by a career Social Security anti-fraud expert as the acting commissioner,” the statement said. “President Trump is committed to appointing the best and most qualified individuals who are dedicated to working on behalf of the American people, not to appease the bureaucracy that has failed them for far too long.”
Trump pledged not to cut social security benefits during his campaign for president. However, each of Trump’s budgets during his first presidential tenure from 2017 to 2021 included cuts to social security. Republicans have also circulated plans to deeply cut programs such as Medicaid, the health insurance program for those on low incomes, to fund tax cuts that overwhelmingly benefit the wealthy.
The news comes after Musk claimed, without evidence: “We got people in there that are 150 years old.” He referred to SSA beneficiaries and made the claims at a White House press conference last week. He said: “Now, do you know anyone that’s 150? … So that’s a case where I think they’re probably dead.”
SSA terminates payments to any beneficiary older than 115. Also, some computer programmers argued Musk’s fraud claims could have a simple explanation: many government agencies use a 60-year-old programming language called Cobol. That program includes a reference date to 1875 that could be used when no birth date is available.
Musk doubled down on the claims on Monday on X, his social media platform, where he posted an unverified screenshot that he claimed was proof of social security fraud.
“Maybe Twilight is real and there are a lot of vampires collecting Social Security,” Musk said.
A July report from the SSA’s inspector general office found that 0.84% of payments were made improperly, most of them overpayments. SSA processes more than $1.4tn in benefits each year, with overpayments equal to about $10bn a year on average from 2015 to 2022.
Notably, until recently, SSA’s inspector general was a Trump appointee. In May 2024, Gail Ennis resigned amid bipartisan congressional pressure after it was revealed that an anti-fraud program she oversaw levied hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines against poor and disabled social security beneficiaries.
Source: www.theguardian.com