It was 90 years ago that Congress passed the Social Security Act of 1935, which was signed into law by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as a key part of his New Deal. Millions of American seniors continue to rely on Social Security benefits after they retire, but former Maryland Democratic Governor Martin O'Malley — who was commissioner of the U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) under former President Joe Biden — fears that an "interruption of benefits" will occur because of major layoffs at the SSA being carried out by the Trump administration with the help of the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
O'Malley is hardly the only Democrat who is sounding the alarm about the Trump administration and DOGE's attack on the vaunted social insurance program.
During a Friday afternoon, April 4 appearance on MSNBC, attorney James Roosevelt III — a grandson of FDR and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt who co-chairs the Democratic National Committee's Rules and Bylaws Committee — warned that Republicans have been attacking Social Security for 90 years and aren't letting up during Donald Trump's second presidency.
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Roosevelt, now 79, told MSNBC's Chris Jansing, "FDR intended it to be constructed so that, as he put it, no damn politician could attack it. That's why it has its own dedicated funding source. Dwight Eisenhower said politicians could attack it, but they would be booted out of office very quickly. It should be the third rail because it is created to be the solid, reliable source of income in retirement and in disability and for survivors. But it has been under attack from Republicans from the day it was passed — who first wanted to repeal it outright up until World War 2."
Roosevelt continued, "They failed on that. Then, they tried to cut benefits. That's when my father started the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare in the early 1980s."
FDR's grandson noted GOP efforts to "privatize" Social Security, which he warned, is an idea Republicans haven't given up on.
"Now, President Trump and President Musk have come up with the idea of hollowing it out from the inside," Roosevelt told Jansing. "They're firing staff that was already at its lowest level. Staff was at their lowest numbers ever, with the highest number of beneficiaries…. Now, they're firing staff: about 12 percent of the staff. They're doing away with phone lines, and they're closing offices — all to make it not work."
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When Jansing brought up Musk's claims that Social Security is full of "fraud" and is a "Ponzi scheme," Roosevelt responded, "Well, in fact, the fraud charge is ridiculous ... Social Security has one of the lowest levels of payment errors — way below 1 percent... And then, you hear this Ponzi scheme thing, which shows that Mr. Musk just doesn't understand what Social Security is."
"A Ponzi scheme is a get-rich-quick investment that is funded by other people's investments; Social Security is an insurance plan," he continued. "It's like homeowner's or auto insurance: People pay premiums, benefits are paid to people who earn them.… It can't be a Ponzi scheme because it's an insurance plan."
Watch the full video below or at this link.
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