Latest news with #IneligibleMasterFile
Yahoo
19-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
DOGE Goons at Social Security Forced to Bring Migrants Back to Life
Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) goons at the Social Security Administration were forced to resurrect dozens of immigrants from the dead over the past week. Elon Musk's engineers had carried out a scheme to falsely list more than 6,000 immigrants as dead in a Social Security database known as the 'death master file,' The Washington Post reported last week. Entry into the file cuts a person off from key financial services, such as receiving benefits and accessing a bank account. As part of President Donald Trump's crackdown on immigration, the goal was to pressure the migrants to 'self deport,' The New York Times reported. Now, almost three dozen of the immigrants have protested the move, demonstrated that they are alive, and won a victory: They are no longer listed among the deceased, the Post reported Friday. The immigrants, who include a Haitian refugee and a child, have shown up at Social Security offices with driver's licenses, work orders, and letters from their states declaring them dead. While Musk's team was planning the move over the last few months, senior staffers at Social Security had expressed concern that it was illegal, the Post reported. But the change was pushed through anyway by the agency's Trump-loyal chief, Leland Dudek, and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. The Post reported that one top IT official was physically removed from his office by security officers after he voiced concerns about the plan. The White House, which didn't immediately answer the Daily Beast's request for comment, argued to the Post that the file wasn't actually for dead people. 'This reporting is false. These illegal aliens were never classified as dead,' spokesperson Liz Huston told the paper. 'The 'Death Master File' was renamed the 'Ineligible Master File' prior to their names being transferred. Once U.S. Customs and Border Protection terminated their parole, these individuals were no longer eligible for benefits, and Social Security Administration quickly took action to protect the benefits of hardworking American citizens.' However, the paper pushed back on the White House's claims. The Post said that both a White House official and a Social Security official had previously confirmed that the immigrants were labeled as dead. It also reported that, as of Friday, the file was still referred to as the 'death master file' in Social Security's internal systems and on its website.
Yahoo
16-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Hiltzik: Trump's Kafkaesque attack on Social Security: Declaring living people as dead
In so many ways the Trump administration has given us a window into a dystopian world — flouting a unanimous decision by the Supreme Court, elevating scientific myth into healthcare policy and so on. But its latest attack on the Social Security system is arguably the most frightening of all. Reportedly pressured by Elon Musk's DOGE team and by Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, the current stewards of Social Security have allowed the government to declare 6,300 people "dead" in a crucial Social Security database, even though they're very much alive. The initial reports of this action were reported by the New York Times and Washington Post, but it was confirmed for me, if somewhat obliquely, by a White House spokeswoman. You'd have a hard time explaining this to someone in a way that doesn't seem dystopian. Devin O'Connor, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities "President Trump promised mass deportations and by removing the monetary incentive for illegal aliens to come and stay, we will encourage them to self-deport," the spokeswoman, Elizabeth Huston, told me by email. The White House claims that "DHS identified over 6,300 temporarily paroled aliens on the terrorist watch list or with FBI criminal records," and as of April 8 "terminated" their right to hold Social Security numbers or receive benefits. "To prevent them from receiving any payments," the White House told me, the Social Security Administration moved their numbers into what the White House calls the 'Ineligible Master File." What's that? It's what is officially known as Social Security's 'Death Master File," the database of deceased number holders. Make no mistake: In effect, these 6,300 living, breathing individuals have been declared "dead" by Trump administration fiat. "You'd have a hard time explaining this to someone in a way that doesn't seem dystopian," says Devin O'Connor, an expert on Social Security at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Social Security advocates are aghast. "As with most of the actions of the Social Security Administration since Trump came into office, we cannot make rational sense of the policy to place immigrants on the SSA's list of deceased persons," says Max Richtman, chief executive of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. Read more: Hiltzik: Acting commissioner's disastrous reign shows that Social Security needs protection from Trump "These are people who are in the United States legally and need active Social Security numbers in order to work and transact personal business," Richtman says. "By placing them on the list of dead persons, the Trump administration is needlessly preventing them from utilizing their Social Security numbers for legitimate reasons." Before we delve further into the consequences of this action — for the newly "dead," for all Social Security beneficiaries and indeed American citizens, and for the Social Security system itself — a few words on how this came about. It started on inauguration day, when Trump abruptly terminated four Biden administration humanitarian programs granting legal U.S. residence to applicants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela seeking asylum. By the end of Biden's term, more than 500,000 applicants had been granted so-called parole via the programs known collectively as CHNV. Typically, they feared political violence or death in their home countries. After passing national security and public safety scrutiny and showing that they had a U.S. sponsor to provide housing and other support, they were granted a "parole" of up to two years permitting them to work legally, which required them to obtain Social Security numbers and to contribute payroll tax to the program. During that period, they could seek more permanent permission to stay in the country. As of April 8, they lost those rights and obligations. The White House hasn't specified what evidence it has that the 6,300 immigrants declared "dead" were members of terrorist groups or FBI-designated criminals. As it happens, the termination order was blocked Monday by federal Judge Indira Talwani of Boston. In a 41-page order, Talwani raised the question of whether Congress had given Trump the authority, "after parole has been granted and individuals have entered the country on a lawful basis," to revoke the grants of parole "en masse." She wrote: "The answer is no." The revocation, she ruled, would have to be on a case-by-case basis, just as their paroles had been granted. Read more: Hiltzik: A Social Security insider describes DOGE's rampage at the agency and the threat to your benefits Meanwhile, Tuesday in Baltimore, federal Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander convened a hearing over whether the Social Security Administration has complied with her earlier order to keep DOGE employees' hands off the agency's records — an issue on which the unilateral "death" designations may well be relevant. Hollander had ordered acting Commissioner Leland Dudek to appear for testimony, but the government has refused to allow him to appear. That brings us back to the Death Master File. (The administration has said it should be referred to now as the "Ineligible Master File," but its authority to change its official designation isn't clear, and in any case this looks merely like an attempt to obscure the nature of the file itself.) The DMF is one of the most important and closely supervised databases in the Social Security Administration's possession. Currently it contains more than 141 million names of deceased workers, along with their Social Security numbers and their dates of birth and death. The program uses the information, according to former Social Security official Tiffany Flick, for the purpose of "discontinuing benefits payments to deceased individuals, confirming an individual's right to survivor benefits, and identifying fraud" carried out by users of dead persons' Social Security numbers. The information is carefully vetted unless it comes from family members, a state agency or a funeral home, Flick said in a court declaration. The agency takes pains to verify reports from anyone else. Of the 2.9 million death reports received each year, Flick said, fewer than one-third of 1% typically have to be corrected. Federal law requires the agency to keep the full database confidential. A redacted version, however, is marketed via the Department of Commerce to banks, credit agencies and other financial institutions — but only if they can pass an annual certification in which they have to show they can protect the data from illicit use. The limited version contains only information that is more than three years old. There can be no question that "intentionally marking people who are still living as dead" in the master file "is unheard of and improper," Flick stated. Beyond that, "when Social Security incorrectly declares someone dead, it ruins their lives," observes Nancy Altman, president of the advocacy organization Social Security Works. In 2023, Altman notes, "a Maryland woman was wrongly declared dead and found her health insurance and Social Security benefits terminated, her home listed for sale, her credit cards canceled, and her water shut off. Her health deteriorated as she spent endless hours trying to undo the mistake. Indeed, she did actually die seven months later." Because the DMF is viewed as authoritative by financial services companies, adds O'Connor, its misuse can cause "disruption in your bank account access, your credit cards canceled, your pension benefits being cut off, your insurance coverage canceled or an insurance claim denied. If you apply for a job your application could be rejected, or have a denial of credit." Read more: Hiltzik: Trump, the GOP and DOGE have launched their attack on Social Security. You should start worrying now The very idea that government bureaucrats can designate living persons as dead for reasons other than their actual death should send shudders through all Social Security participants, citizens and otherwise — especially given the manipulation of the program from Trump acolytes already and the absence of official oversight over DOGE's rampaging minions. "Now, if you're included in the Death Master File even by accident, how do you show not only that you're not dead, but that you don't belong on the file for some other unknown, mysterious reason?" O'Connor asks. "It's creating the potential for some Kafkaesque bureaucratic nightmares every time they make a mistake — and there will be mistakes." As for the administration's contention that the 6,300 "dead" people are on a terrorism watch list or FBI list, the administration's treatment of facts and statistics when it comes to immigrants or Social Security does not inspire confidence. The administration, for instance, has consistently described Kilmar Abrego Garcia, whom it admits to having transported to El Salvador illegally, as an "illegal alien" and a member of the criminal gang MS-13. But he was in the U.S. legally, and no valid evidence has been produced to show he's a member of MS-13 — quite the contrary, he may be a victim of MS-13. DOGE's claims about Social Security data are almost risibly ignorant. Musk asserted that DOGE found millions of dead people as old as 150 receiving benefits, but he was misinterpreting a software artifact. The manipulation of the Death Master File itself has obliterated its validity as a data source for financial and commercial institutions. If those institutions can no longer trust what was once the gold standard for information about their present or future customers, how can it be used at all? What's scariest about the cavalier manipulation of the Death Master File is that Trump's refusal to observe bureaucratic norms, statutory limitations, and even to respond to court orders, points to the question of how far he's willing to go. Designating living persons as dead could be only the beginning. "If they can do this to somebody," O'Connor says, "they can do it to anybody." Get the latest from Michael HiltzikCommentary on economics and more from a Pulitzer Prize me up. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Yahoo
15-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Why were 6.3K migrants moved to Social Security's ‘death' list?
More than 6,300 migrants who are authorized to work in the U.S. have been moved to a Social Security Administration (SSA) list of people who have died after officials deemed them to pose security threats or as wanted by federal law enforcement agencies. A White House official confirmed to NewsNation that the immigrants who were transferred to the SSA's Ineligible Master File — previously known as the Death Master File — were found by the Department of Homeland Security to be on the terrorist watch list or to have FBI criminal records. All of those moved to the list entered the U.S. illegally during the Biden administration, the official stated. As of April 8, those on the list lost their temporary parole from Customs and Border Protection, making them ineligible to obtain work authorization or receive benefits such as unemployment payments, college loans or Medicaid, the official said. The Trump administration has praised the actions. 'President Trump promised mass deportations and by removing the monetary incentive for illegal aliens to come and stay, we will encourage them to self-deport,' White House spokesperson Elizabeth Huston said in a statement provided to NewsNation. 'He is delivering on his promise he made to the American people.' Others, however, have raised concerns about adding living people to a list supposedly reserved for those who have died. The New York Times, citing two people with knowledge of the process of adding the migrants to the list, which includes children, said that they will be given supposed dates of death. In addition to losing the ability to work or collect federal benefits, the lack of a Social Security number makes other financial matters difficult, the report said. 'It's tantamount to financial murder,' Martin O'Malley, who served as the commissioner of the SSA during the Biden administration, told the newspaper. The Ineligibility Master List is an SSA data list that includes more than 94 million records dating back to 1936. It was created from Social Security records of people who have died and who were issued Social Security numbers. The Times reviewed documents that included the names of the 6,300 migrants who were moved to the list at the urging of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Once on the Ineligibility Master List, a person's Social Security number or Tax Identification Number is revoked, barring them from collecting certain benefits. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem speaks at U.S. Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak during a tour, Monday, March 17, 2025, in Kodiak, Alaska. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon) In an email to SSA staff obtained by the newspaper from acting director Leland Dudek, the agency leader wrote that the financial lives of those migrants added to the list 'would be terminated.' A White House official stated that of those added to the list, 905 of them were collecting Medicaid benefits totaling $276,000, including four people who were on the terrorist watch list. Another 41 of the migrants who previously were issued tax ID numbers had received $42,000 in unemployment insurance benefits, while 22 had federal student loans totaling $289,000. The move comes shortly after several IRS officials resigned after the agency said it would assist federal agents in locating immigrants in the U.S. illegally. The IRS previously agreed to give Immigration and Customs Enforcement access to migrant tax information. Some experts warn the transfer of living persons to the SSA 'death' list violates privacy laws, The Washington Post reported. In March, the SSA posted that 'instances when a person is erroneously reported as deceased to Social Security can be devastating to the individual, spouse and dependent children.' The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently revoked the legal status of 985,000 immigrants who entered the U.S. through the CBP One app during the Biden administration. Those mobile app users made appointments to seek asylum and obtain work authorizations. However, the Trump administration disabled the CBP One app and replaced it with the CBP Home app, which includes functionality that assists migrants with self-deporting themselves. DHS previously revoked parole for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, who had also sought parole through the CBP One app, so long as they could also secure a U.S.-based financial sponsor. The more than 500,000 people affected will lose their status April 24. Tech billionaire Elon Musk, the top adviser for the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), recently claimed at a Wisconsin rally that more than 2 million immigrants who entered the U.S. illegally were given Social Security numbers during fiscal year 2024 alone, giving them improper access to benefits. That figure was a sharp increase from the 590,000 noncitizens who received Social Security numbers in fiscal year 2022 and the 964,000 who received them in 2023, federal data showed. The SSA reports that, in general, only noncitizens who are authorized by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to work in the country are eligible to receive Social Security numbers. Musk previously claimed that he had uncovered 'the biggest fraud in history' when he said DOGE found millions of people who were over 100 years of age listed in the Social Security database. However, NewsNation previously reported that while Dudek acknowledged that there are people who have Social Security numbers who do not have a date of death linked to their record, those people are 'not necessarily receiving benefits. A 2024 report by the Social Security inspector general showed that between 2015 and 2022, less than 1 percent of the $8.6 trillion paid out in benefits was distributed improperly. Most of those funds were overpayments made to living people. 'What Musk has tweeted is not primarily an example of fraud but more like the messy databases kept by Social Security,' said Alex Nowrasteh, the vice president for economic and social policy studies at the libertarian Cato Institute. NewsNation's Andrew Dorn contributed reporting to this story. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
15-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
ICE using Social Security records to aid Trump push to deport illegal immigrants
The Social Security Administration (SSA) has become the latest government agency to join President Donald Trump's deportation push, showing the president's whole-of-government approach to keeping a key campaign promise. "This is the Trump administration using every tool it has in its toolbox to crack down on illegal immigration," Tom Jones, the executive director of the American Accountability Foundation, told Fox News Digital. The comments come as the SSA sifts through the hundreds of thousands of immigrants who are in the country under "temporary parole" status that was granted during the Biden administration and allowed those migrants to have Social Security numbers in order to work. Florida's Largest Venezuelan Stronghold Poised To Join Forces With Ice: Report Trump administration officials claim that more than 6,300 of those people are on the FBI terrorist watch list or have FBI criminal records, according to a report from Axios. The SSA began moving the names of those migrants on the terrorist watch list to its "Death Master File," its current database of dead people, the report notes, adding that the agency has since moved those names to the "Ineligible Master File." Read On The Fox News App The move to tap the SSA comes as Trump has used every resource at his disposal to continue his deportation push, coming after the president used military forces to help secure the border and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to begin cross-checking information for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). But not everyone has been fully on board with Trump's aggressive push, with the IRS and ICE partnerships leading to the resignation of IRS Acting Commissioner Melanie Krause last week. Blue State Sheriffs Combine Forces To Fight Back Against Sanctuary Laws Similar scenarios could play out at the SSA, with some of the agency's staff expressing concern over the data-sharing agreement. "Some agency staff have since checked the names and Social Security numbers of some of the youngest immigrants against data the agency typically uses to search for criminal history and found no evidence of crimes or law enforcement interactions," some staffers told the Washington Post. Jones believes the defections are an example of why Trump's shakeup of the federal workforce is long overdue. "The fact that IRS leadership resigned over cooperating with ICE shows exactly why there needs to be a concerned effort to ensure that the federal workforce is composed of leaders who are willing to implement the president's agenda," Jones said. "For every three senior officials who resign, there are dozens of civil servants below the radar screen who are in place and still able to obstruct the president's agenda." Nevertheless, Jones expects Trump to continue using whatever resources possible to make good on his immigration agenda. "The Social Security Administration is just one example. I suspect we will also see places like OSHA, which has staff on job sites, using their inspectors to target illegal alien workers and the businesses that employ them," Jones said. "This administration has been waiting years to deploy an aggressive America First playbook they built during four years in the wilderness."Original article source: ICE using Social Security records to aid Trump push to deport illegal immigrants
The Hill
15-04-2025
- Politics
- The Hill
Why were 6.3K migrants moved to Social Security's ‘death' list?
More than 6,300 migrants who are authorized to work in the U.S. have been moved to a Social Security Administration (SSA) list of people who have died after officials deemed them to pose security threats or as wanted by federal law enforcement agencies. A White House official confirmed to NewsNation that the immigrants who were transferred to the SSA's Ineligible Master File — previously known as the Death Master File — were found by the Department of Homeland Security to be on the terrorist watch list or to have FBI criminal records. All of those moved to the list entered the U.S. illegally during the Biden administration, the official stated. As of April 8, those on the list lost their temporary parole from Customs and Border Protection, making them ineligible to obtain work authorization or receive benefits such as unemployment payments, college loans or Medicaid, the official said. The Trump administration has praised the actions. 'President Trump promised mass deportations and by removing the monetary incentive for illegal aliens to come and stay, we will encourage them to self-deport,' White House spokesperson Elizabeth Huston said in a statement provided to NewsNation. 'He is delivering on his promise he made to the American people.' Others, however, have raised concerns about adding living people to a list supposedly reserved for those who have died. The New York Times, citing two people with knowledge of the process of adding the migrants to the list, which includes children, said that they will be given supposed dates of death. In addition to losing the ability to work or collect federal benefits, the lack of a Social Security number makes other financial matters difficult, the report said. 'It's tantamount to financial murder,' Martin O'Malley, who served as the commissioner of the SSA during the Biden administration, told the newspaper. What is the Social Security Ineligibility Master List? The Ineligibility Master List is an SSA data list that includes more than 94 million records dating back to 1936. It was created from Social Security records of people who have died and who were issued Social Security numbers. The Times reviewed documents that included the names of the 6,300 migrants who were moved to the list at the urging of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Once on the Ineligibility Master List, a person's Social Security number or Tax Identification Number is revoked, barring them from collecting certain benefits. In an email to SSA staff obtained by the newspaper from acting director Leland Dudek, the agency leader wrote that the financial lives of those migrants added to the list 'would be terminated.' A White House official stated that of those added to the list, 905 of them were collecting Medicaid benefits totaling $276,000, including four people who were on the terrorist watch list. Another 41 of the migrants who previously were issued tax ID numbers had received $42,000 in unemployment insurance benefits, while 22 had federal student loans totaling $289,000. The move comes shortly after several IRS officials resigned after the agency said it would assist federal agents in locating immigrants in the U.S. illegally. The IRS previously agreed to give Immigration and Customs Enforcement access to migrant tax information. Does stripping migrants of Social Security numbers drive deportations? Some experts warn the transfer of living persons to the SSA 'death' list violates privacy laws, The Washington Post reported. In March, the SSA posted that 'instances when a person is erroneously reported as deceased to Social Security can be devastating to the individual, spouse and dependent children.' The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently revoked the legal status of 985,000 immigrants who entered the U.S. through the CBP One app during the Biden administration. Those mobile app users made appointments to seek asylum and obtain work authorizations. However, the Trump administration disabled the CBP One app and replaced it with the CBP Home app, which includes functionality that assists migrants with self-deporting themselves. DHS previously revoked parole for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, who had also sought parole through the CBP One app, so long as they could also secure a U.S.-based financial sponsor. The more than 500,000 people affected will lose their status April 24. Elon Musk's previous claims about migrants and Social Security Tech billionaire Elon Musk, the top adviser for the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), recently claimed at a Wisconsin rally that more than 2 million immigrants who entered the U.S. illegally were given Social Security numbers during fiscal year 2024 alone, giving them improper access to benefits. That figure was a sharp increase from the 590,000 noncitizens who received Social Security numbers in fiscal year 2022 and the 964,000 who received them in 2023, federal data showed. The SSA reports that, in general, only noncitizens who are authorized by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to work in the country are eligible to receive Social Security numbers. Musk previously claimed that he had uncovered 'the biggest fraud in history' when he said DOGE found millions of people who were over 100 years of age listed in the Social Security database. However, NewsNation previously reported that while Dudek acknowledged that there are people who have Social Security numbers who do not have a date of death linked to their record, those people are 'not necessarily receiving benefits. A 2024 report by the Social Security inspector general showed that between 2015 and 2022, less than 1 percent of the $8.6 trillion paid out in benefits was distributed improperly. Most of those funds were overpayments made to living people. 'What Musk has tweeted is not primarily an example of fraud but more like the messy databases kept by Social Security,' said Alex Nowrasteh, the vice president for economic and social policy studies at the libertarian Cato Institute.
