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'A Small Group of People Wanted to Do Away With Social Security From the Beginning' Janine Jackson ([link removed])


Janine Jackson interviewed Social Security Works' Nancy Altman about attacks on Social Security for the March 21, 2025, episode ([link removed]) of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

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The Truth About Social Security

Strong Arm Press (2018 ([link removed]) )

Janine Jackson: Social Security has been overwhelmingly popular, and under vehement attack ([link removed]) from some quarters, since it began. And for decades, elite news media have generated a standard assessment ([link removed]) : It's the most popular program, hence the "third rail ([link removed]) " of politicking, and also, based on willful misreading of how it works ([link removed]) , it's about to be insolvent any minute—the latter notion sitting alongside corporate media's constant refrain that private is always better than public, just because, like, efficiency and all that.

Now, in this frankly wild, “Only losers care about caring for one another" and "Shouldn't the richest just control everything?” moment, Social Security is on the chopping block ([link removed]) for real. Still, as ever, the attack is rooted in disinformation, but with a truly critical press corps largely missing in action, myth-busting might not be enough.

We are joined now by veteran Social Security explainer and defender Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works ([link removed]) and author of, among other titles, The Truth About Social Security: ([link removed]) The Founder's Words Refute Revisionist History, Zombie Lies and Common Misunderstandings. She joins us now by phone. Welcome back to CounterSpin, Nancy Altman.

Nancy Altman: Thank you so much for having me.
Truthout: As DOGE Mauls Social Security, Profit-Hungry Private Equity Is Swooping In

Truthout (3/16/25 ([link removed]) )

JJ: A lot of us are in a kind of blurry, “holy heck, is this really happening?” mode, but titrating out what is actually happening today is important—set aside from whether courts will eventually rule against it, or how it might play out. In "what is happening" news, I'm reading ([link removed]) in Truthout via Bloomberg that three individuals representing private equity concerns have shown up at the Social Security Administration. How weird is that? What can that possibly mean?

NA: It's horrible. And if you can believe it, it is even worse. As soon as Donald Trump was inaugurated on January 20, the DOGE guys—the DOGE boys, as young as 19 ([link removed]) —were swarming ([link removed]) all over the Social Security Administration. As you said in your introduction, there has been a small group of people, completely out of touch, who wanted to do away with Social Security from the beginning. They've always been defeated ([link removed]) , but unfortunately, they now are in control of the White House.

It’s Donald Trump. Despite all his lies in the campaign that he wouldn't touch Social Security, he proposed cuts ([link removed]) in every one ([link removed]) of his budgets in his first term. It's Elon Musk, who unbelievably called ([link removed]) it "the biggest Ponzi scheme" in history, which is such a slander. And it's Russell Vought, who is the director of the Office of Management and Budget, who's architect ([link removed]) of Project 2025. And what we're seeing is Project 2025 on steroids. So you've got private venture people there, you have DOGE guys stealing our data, all in an effort to undermine
our Social Security system.
AP: Tens of millions of dead people aren’t getting Social Security checks, despite Trump and Musk claims

AP (2/19/25 ([link removed]) )

JJ: The line is that, “Oh no, they're not attacking Social Security itself, just fraud ([link removed]) within it.” Now, the bad faith is palpable, but what is your response to that notion, that it's really just the fraud that's under attack?

NA: As you said, I wrote a book called The Truth About Social Security, and one of the zombie lies is one of the ones you mentioned. They all say, “Oh, this private sector is so much more efficient and so much better and blah, blah, blah.”

Actually, Social Security is extremely efficiently run ([link removed]) . Less than about a half a penny of every dollar spent is spent on administration ([link removed]) . The other more than 99 cents comes back in benefits. That's so much more efficient than you find with 401k for private sector insurance, where you can get 15, 20% administrative costs and hidden fees and so forth.

And that's also with improper payments— there are a lot of overpayments, underpayments, which were done because Congress has made it so difficult to administer, and some of it's just impossible to avoid. But 99.7% of Social Security benefits are paid accurately ([link removed]) to the right people, on time in full, and about 0.3%—and again, there's much more improper payments in the private sector—but of that 0.3%, the overwhelming amount of what are called improper payments are overpayments and underpayments.

So, for example, Social Security requires, to get your benefit, you have to have been alive every day of the month before. Now I think that's wrong, and I think you should get a proportion of payments, but that's not how the law works. So if you die on the last day of the month, and you get your payment on the third day of the following month, and the money is put in your account, that's an overpayment.

Now, it doesn't just sit there. As soon as the federal government realizes that the person has died the last day, they go in immediately, usually within a day or two, and take that money back. But that is mainly overpayments, underpayments.

Fraud is vanishingly small, and the way that fraud is caught is, first we have an inspector general. Donald Trump fired ([link removed]) the Social Security Administration inspector general as soon as he got into office. And front-line workers, and they've been firing and inducing all kinds of workers out who are the ones who would catch the fraud.

So although they say they're going after fraud, waste and abuse, they are creating so much waste. They are abusing the workforce, and through that, the American people. And they are opening the door to fraud, unfortunately.

JJ: I have seen leftists take issue with the “It's my money” idea on Social Security, because actually it's an intergenerational program. Now choosing that as a point of emphasis in the current context is a choice that I have thoughts about. But do you see meaningful confusion about whose money is at stake here, and whether workers paying into it today are truly entitled to it?
NYT; How Unauthorized Immigrants Help Finance Social Security Benefits

New York Times (1/14/25 ([link removed]) )

NA: Here's where the confusion is. I don't think there's confusion on that point. I think most Americans—which is why the program is so wildly popular—recognize that these are benefits they earned. It is deferred compensation. It is part of your earnings.

So you have your current cash compensation, you have deferred compensation in the form of pensions—whether it's a pension sponsored by the employer or 401k or a defined benefit plan—and you have Social Security. You also have what are called contingent benefits, which are disability insurance, survivors benefits, and those are all earned.

What is the misunderstanding, and this is, again, people like Elon Musk and others who are just spreading lies about this program, are, “Oh, there are all these immigrants who are undocumented people stealing our money.” That is a lie. Those people who are undocumented are unable ([link removed]) to receive Social Security, and even if they become documented, and can show that they had made contributions, they still don't, and I think this is wrong, but they still don't get the benefits they have earned.

But Americans who are here paying in, it is an earned benefit. And when Elon Musk and Donald Trump say, “Oh, there's fraud, and we're going to cut the benefits,” they are cutting your benefits, and people should keep hold of their wallets.

JJ: The fact that it's just about fraud is one lie. And another one is that the things that are happening are just kind of tweaks. And now the latest, maybe not the latest when this airs, but we hear that people who file for benefits, or who want to change the banks that their benefits go to, now they can't do it by phone ([link removed]) . They have to do it online, through one of those easy-breezy government interfaces, or go into a field office. And that might sound like a minor thing, unless you actually think about it with human beings in mind.
AP: A list of the Social Security offices across the US expected to close this year

AP (3/19/25 ([link removed]) )

NA: It is outrageous. And when you connect the dots, Donald Trump said he wasn't going to cut our benefits. He said that before when he ran in 2016 ([link removed]) , and every one ([link removed]) of his budgets in the first term cut our benefits.

He said it again ([link removed]) in 2024. But now that he's there, I think they're trying to figure out ways to do it. And what they are doing is they are throwing the program in complete chaos.

People who receive benefits are disproportionately ([link removed]) seniors, people with disabilities. Interestingly, it's the largest children's program ([link removed]) , too, because it's survivor's benefits, but it often covers people who have difficulty with mobility.

The internet, as you said, is very hard to use. And, by the way, some of the people that got fired were the people who maintained the website. So I think it's going to get harder to use, and that's where the fraud tends to—there is vanishingly small amounts of fraud, but when it occurs, it tends to be online.

Phones are very secure. There’s been no evidence put forward that there's any fraud that's being committed through the phone service.

Requiring everybody to go into field offices, which Donald Trump and Elon Musk have told the General Services Administration to terminate ([link removed]) all the leases, so they're going to be fewer and fewer ([link removed]) field offices. They are terribly understaffed, and the staff that’s there is very overworked.
NIRS: Social Security Spending: Too Little, About Right or Too Much

NIRS (1/25 ([link removed]) )

So you're asking millions of additional Americans to waste time, when they could have gotten on the phone and done what they had to do over the phone. Although they need to hire people for the phone, too, because that's another place with long wait times, and they're going to get longer, given what they're doing.

Trump and DOGE and the others who Republican President Dwight Eisenhower called ([link removed]) a "tiny splinter group" who hate Social Security, but they tried to privatize it. They were unsuccessful in that. And now what they're doing is they're trying to destroy it from within. And we will see pretty soon as it collapses, they'll say, “Oh, the private sector should run it.” That will be horrible. It will undermine all of our economic security.

JJ: Consistent majorities support ([link removed]) Social Security. As we've said, some recent polls ([link removed]) find people saying we spend too little on it. And that's why people, like Republican congressperson Harriet Hageman of Wyoming, are saying ([link removed]) , “Nobody is touching Social Security” in town halls.
New Republic: Musk and Trump Are Cutting Popular Programs. That’s Deliberate.

New Republic (2/17/25 ([link removed]) )

But it's also why Liza Featherstone, for example, is reminding us ([link removed]) that cutting popular programs isn't a mistake, it's a conscious effort, and this is what you're just getting at, it's a conscious effort to make the government actually useless, so that people will stop thinking of it as a source of anything good. And, one supposes, they will then look to beneficent billionaires. But this is not a mistake, this chaos that Social Security is being thrown into.

NA: Not at all. This is Project 2025 on steroids. The architects of Project 2025 really started this crusade ([link removed]) back in the 1970s, actually when I started working on the program. It's been 50 years. They've tried undermining confidence in the program, because it is too popular; even the most conservative-minded Republicans love Social Security, do not want to see it cut, and correctly think that it should be expanded. So they can't directly confront Social Security, because they'll all get voted out of office.

So the question is, how can they undermine it while looking like they're protecting it? And the old standby is this vague "fraud, waste and abuse." Nobody wants fraud, waste or abuse. But the reality is, they are creating waste and abuse ([link removed]) . They are opening the door to possible fraudulent actors. And they're all doing it, as you say, so that people just give up on government and give more and more money, upward redistribution of our earned benefits, into the pockets of Elon Musk and other billionaires.

JJ: Finally, I think the way that news media talk is meaningful. When they say, “They're saying these things about Social Security, and they're untrue,” to me, that lands different than, “They're saying these things although they're untrue.” One is narrating a nightmare, and the other is noting a disruption that calls for some intervention.

TheHill.com says ([link removed]) that Elon Musk's false rhetoric on Social Security is “confounding experts and worrying advocates.” Doesn't say advocates of what. I just personally can't forgive this demonstrative earnestness of elite media, when they can get emotional, you know, about welfare reform and “we need to cut food stamps.” But now they're trying to be high and dry about cutting lifelines for seniors and disabled people.

And I'm not talking about all media. There are exceptions. But I want to ask you, finally, what would responsible, people-first journalism be doing right now, do you think?
Nancy Altman of Social Security Works

Nancy Altman: "Social Security, and Medicare and Medicaid. In my 50 years working on the programs, this is the most severe threat I've ever seen to them."

NA: You so put your finger on it. I mean, it is outrageous, when you think about it, that Donald Trump will be spewing lies about Social Security in a nationwide, televised joint session of Congress, went on for minutes and minutes, talking about all these dead people are getting benefits, and that is a complete lie ([link removed]) . It has been debunked a zillion times, including by his own acting commissioner, and yet he went before the nation and said it.

So there is a method to the madness. This is not confounding at all. It's an effort to convince everybody that the government is full of corruption and fraud, so when they destroy it, they have their cover.

So I think, first of all, what mainstream media should do is call a lie a lie when it happens, and they should try to call it out in real time, and there should be some solidarity. I still can't believe that the AP was banned ([link removed]) from the White House, and all the mainstream media just didn't all walk out.

So this is a time our institutions, all our institutions, are under a threat. This is the Steve Bannon “Flood the Zone ([link removed]) .” So there are so many outrages at once. All of our institutions are being attacked, including the media.

My concern is Social Security, and Medicare and Medicaid. In my 50 years working on the programs, this is the most severe threat I've ever seen to them. I think everybody's got to be vigilant. I think they've got to make their voices heard, and I know there's going to be protest on April 5. People should turn out for that. And the media should wake up and realize that everything is under assault, including them.

JJ: We've been speaking with Nancy Altman from Social Security Works. They're online at SocialSecurityWorks.org. ([link removed]) Nancy Altman, thank you so much for joining us this week on CounterSpin.

NA: Again, thank you so much for having me.


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