The Honorable Norma J. Torres
2227 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515

Dear Representative Torres,

On behalf of the millions of members and supporters of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, I am writing to endorse your legislation, the “Repairing Social Security after DOGE and Trump Act”. Members of the National Committee come from all walks of life and every political persuasion. What unites them is their passion for protecting and strengthening Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the other programs that are so vitally important to older Americans.

Since the beginning of the Trump Administration the Social Security Administration (SSA) has either fired or incentivized thousands of employees to leave the Agency. Although the exact number of current employees is unclear, the reduction in staffing of about 12 percent has left the Agency with the lowest level of staff in decades, despite demands for customer service increasing as 10,000 baby boomers reach age 65 each day. The consequences of fewer staff handling more customers is clear – all around the country stories abound of longer wait times, both on the phone lines and for in person meetings at local field offices, longer delays in processing applications, especially in the disability program, and frustrated Americans demanding the services they have paid for through their payroll contributions. 

In response, SSA has attempted to obscure the impact of the staffing cuts by removing critical metric data from its website, so neither the public nor Congress can monitor their progress, and claimed that service has actually improved, despite growing evidence to the contrary. SSA Commissioner Frank Bisignano has repeatedly claimed that incorporating Artificial Intelligence into SSA operations will more than compensate for the reductions in staff, resulting in more efficient and less costly SSA operations. These claims come despite the fact that SSA’s customer base is among the least able to conduct complex financial transactions online, or even by telephone. Seniors and members of the disability community are highly reliant on in-person meetings at local field offices, and these are becoming more difficult to schedule as staffing shrinks. 

Unlike most other agencies, SSA operations are financed nearly entirely through the FICA payroll tax contributions that are withheld from American workers with each and every paycheck. Workers have the right to expect the customer service they have paid for. When SSA delays answering questions or processing applications, the result is that applicants lose the benefits they would have received if SSA was operating with a sufficient number of fully trained staff. The delays can result in a lifetime of lower benefits that are compounded over time, as Cost-of-Living Adjustments (COLAs) are annually applied to a lower base amount than they would have been had initial benefits been approved in a timely manner. 

Your bill endeavors to correct this problem by requiring a future Social Security Administration to calculate the amount of benefits lost by unreasonable delays in SSA operations and compensate beneficiaries for their losses. It will be a challenge for a future SSA to establish a process for accurately measuring the impact on beneficiaries, but it is important work that must be done to prevent DOGE’s calamitous activities at SSA from imposing a lifetime of lower benefits on countless blameless individuals. Your bill will go a long way toward restoring trust in this venerable agency, and ensuring that workers and their families are not penalized for this Administration’s haphazard approach to SSA operations. 

For that reason, the National Committee strongly endorses the “Repairing Social Security after DOGE and Trump Act”.  Please let us know how we can help you to advance this needed legislation.

Sincerely,

Max Richtman
President and CEO