GOP Starting to Fear Blowback Over Social Security

Elon Musk has been dipping his toes into what NBC News calls "one of the most politically dangerous arenas in America"—Social Security payments. And multiple Republican senators want very much for him to butt out, reports the Hill.

• "He should zip it on that. It's not helpful," one GOP senator who asked to remain anonymous tells the outlet. "It plays right into Democrats' hands; they want to talk about Social Security cuts, Medicare cuts, Medicaid cuts. We don't. The president does not want to talk about that. He's against all those things."
• Another GOP senator, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, went public with her complaints. "It doesn't help the president when you have somebody who clearly is not worried about whether or not Social Security benefits are going to be there for him" talking about cuts at the Social Security Administration, she says, referring to Musk's status as the world's richest person. The Hill says it spoke with "several" senators voicing the same sentiment.

• Musk has recently called Social Security "the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time" and has insisted without evidence that it is rife with fraud, much of it the fault of undocumented immigrants. "By using entitlements fraud, the Democrats have been able to attract and retain vast numbers of illegal immigrants," he said on Sen. Ted Cruz's podcast this week. USA Today notes that a report last year from the agency's inspector general estimated that less than 1% of its payments from 2015 to 2022 were improper.
• All of this comes amid the backdrop of cutbacks and changes at the agency, including 7,000 job cuts, the shuttering of dozens of local offices, consolidation of programs, and, most recently, a requirement that millions of elderly and disabled Americans who file for claims by phone will instead have to appear in person at an office, per the Washington Post. An internal agency memo predicts the latter change will essentially cut many people off from their benefits, per Axios.
• The White House insists that President Trump is not going to cut benefits, only fraud. While Trump voiced support for privatizing the agency two decades ago, he has promised to protect entitlements as a candidate and president, per NBC.
• But Democrats have been quick to say otherwise, as the anonymous GOP senator quoted by the Hill feared. "DOGE is closing nearly 50 Social Security offices across the country ... and now they're limiting phone support," tweeted Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. "Make no mistake, this is a full-blown attack on Social Security. Elon Musk is trying to take away benefits you earned."

(More Social Security stories.)