Opinion - Social Security isn't the third rail of American politics any more
It seems the Trump administration is doing no better getting its story straight about Social Security than managing the agency itself. The president has said many times, without qualifiers, that he is 'not going to touch Social Security.' But almost daily, others on his team are saying otherwise — and unlike the president, they are adding qualifiers and contingencies and scenarios in which Social Security would indeed be touched.
Team Trump seems to have concluded that Social Security is no longer the 'third rail of American politics' — that they can touch it and live to tell the tale. It will be up to voters to prove them wrong.
The administration is offering a bargain, designed to minimize blowback as it weakens Social Security: We will protect what older Americans are now getting, they wink, if those Americans don't make a fuss about cutting future benefits for the young and the undeserving.
We can see a hint of that strategy in the March 17 statement from Karoline Leavitt, the president's press secretary, when she said, 'Any American receiving Social Security benefits will continue to receive them.'
Then, on March 21, Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick suggested that anyone complaining about an interruption in their Social Security benefits must be a 'fraudster.' Fraudsters, Lutnick observed, 'always make … the loudest noise, screaming, yelling, and complaining,' To the murmured agreement of his podcast host, Lutnick added, 'Anyone whose been in a payment system knows the easiest way to find a fraudster is to stop payments and listen.'
There you have it — a framing that allows Lutnick and his colleagues in the Trump administration to say they do not intend to cut Social Security while devising plans to undermine it and shake the faith of the millions of Americans who depend on it.
One way to do so is to make dealing with the Social Security Administration as painful as dealing with the Department of Motor Vehicles or your local cable television provider.
Robert Kuttner, co-founder of The American Prospect, calls it 'pure mischief, intended to weaken a widely appreciated and efficient public system that Elon Musk has disparaged as a Ponzi scheme.' Doing so will turn Social Security into a 'soft target' by tarnishing its reputation and getting the public ready when they eventually talk about privatizing Social Security.
And last month, Frank Bisignano, nominated to head the Social Security Administration, echoed President Trump's March 4 speech to Congress, where he went on at length about 'shocking levels of incompetence and probable fraud in the Social Security program for our seniors.' While Bisignano, describing himself as 'fundamentally a DOGE person,' said his 'objective isn't to touch benefits … there is going to be fraud, waste and abuse in there.'
Those warnings are the administration's way of changing how Americans think of Social Security — not as an earned benefit program but as a part of the welfare system.
Historians remind us that the New Dealers who created Social Security fought hard against such a portrait. They succeeded by connecting it to a longstanding American commitment to disaster relief, with the disaster being elderly people living in misery. Trump and his allies want to undo that legacy and associate Social Security with all the negative connotations that accompany being on welfare— a modern version of Ronald Reagan's attack on 'welfare queens' that blames illegal immigrants for society's ills.
Trump highlighted that connection throughout last year's presidential campaign, blaming Democrats for endangering Social Security and Medicare 'by allowing the INVASION OF THE MIGRANTS.'
That is why, at the end of his remarks about Social Security during his podcast interview, Lutnick promised that the administration would not 'take one penny from someone who deserves Social Security.' The American people should not take his word for it.
Austin Sarat is the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science at Amherst College.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Bloomberg
8 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
NJ's Sherrill, Ciattarelli Win Primaries in Governor's Race
New Jersey voters have chosen Mikie Sherrill to face off against Jack Ciattarelli, pitting a moderate Democrat against a Trump-endorsed Republican in the first gubernatorial election since last year's presidential race. Sherrill won the Democratic primary, while Jack Ciattarelli carried the Republican contest, according to the Associated Press.
Yahoo
9 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Jack Ciattarelli secures the Republican nomination for New Jersey governor
Former Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli secured the Republican nomination for New Jersey governor shortly after the polls closed in the June 10 primary. While the results will not be official until later this month, Ciattarelli was declared the victor by the Associated Press and the Washington Post at about 8:17 p.m. There were hundreds gathered at Ciattarelli's party at Bell Works in Holmdel well before the polls closed though no official announcement of his win had been made as of 8:30 p.m. Ciattarelli, who narrowly lost to incumbent Gov. Phil Murphy back in 2021, all but secured the nomination a few weeks ago when President Donald Trump endorsed him in a social media post. In a social media post, Trump said the former assemblyman is a 'terrific America first candidate.' 'Jack, who after getting to know and understand MAGA, has gone ALL IN, and is now 100%," Trump wrote, seemingly acknowledging that Ciattarelli initially called the president a "charlatan" in 2015. Ciattarelli later endorsed Trump and, in 2020, the former New Jersey Assemblyman spoke at a "Stop the Steal" rally promoting the false conspiracy theory that voter fraud put Democrat Joe Biden in office. Ciattarelli has never publicly endorsed that view. Results: See North Jersey 2025 primary results for Bergen, Essex, Passaic and Morris counties After losing to Gov. Phil Murphy in 2021, the Republican said he would run again. He lost in the 2017 primary to former Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno. A Somerville resident and Raritan native, Ciattarelli has spent decades in politics and served in the state Assembly and in county and local government. He beat former radio personality Bill Spadea and state Sen. Jon Bramnick. It is unclear who Ciattarelli will face in November as he tries to succeed Murphy. As of June 1, there were 6,574,692 registered voters in New Jersey, including 2,451,752 Democrats and 1,624,437 Republicans. That is 44,302 fewer Democrats and 60,666 more Republicans than at this time last year. The nation will be watching the Garden State's general election unfold as a bellwether — New Jersey and Virginia are the only states holding elections for governor this year. Pundits are already portraying the two races as referendums on the second Trump administration's policies and agenda. Katie Sobko covers the New Jersey Statehouse. Email: sobko@ This article originally appeared on Jack Ciattarelli wins Republican nomination for NJ governor
New York Times
9 minutes ago
- New York Times
U.S. Court Agrees to Keep Trump Tariffs Intact as Appeal Gets Underway
A federal appeals court agreed on Tuesday to allow President Trump to maintain many of his tariffs on China and other U.S. trading partners, extending a pause granted shortly after another panel of judges ruled in late May that the import taxes were illegal. The decision, from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, delivered an important but interim victory for the Trump administration, which had warned that any interruption to its steep duties could undercut the president in talks around the world. But the government still must convince the judges that the president appropriately used a set of emergency powers when he put in place the centerpiece of his economic agenda earlier this year. The Trump administration has already signaled it is willing to fight that battle as far as the Supreme Court. The ruling came shortly after negotiators from the United States and China agreed to a framework intended to extend a trade truce between the two superpowers. The Trump administration had warned that those talks and others would have been jeopardized if the appeals court had not granted a fuller stay while arguments proceeded. At the heart of the legal wrangling is Mr. Trump's novel interpretation of a 1970s law that he used to wage a global trade war on an expansive scale. No president before him had ever used the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, to impose tariffs, and the word itself is not even mentioned in the statute. But the law has formed the foundation of Mr. Trump's campaign to reorient the global economic order. He has invoked its powers to sidestep Congress and impose huge taxes on most global imports, with the goal of raising revenue, bolstering domestic manufacturing and brokering more favorable trade deals with other countries. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
