Yesterday the realization that Elon Musk and his DOGE bandits are dead set on stealing our Social Security hit home for millions of Americans. Perhaps some of the MAGA cultists are still lying to themselves, but plenty of Trump voters now know they made a huge mistake.
Two days ago, Maryland District Judge Ellen Hollander ordered the acting head of the Social Security Administration Leland Dudek to stop DOGE bandits from accessing recipients’ personal information. Dudek responded by threatening to shut down the agency entirely.
March 20 (Reuters) – A federal judge said on Thursday the Social Security Administration likely violated privacy laws by giving tech billionaire Elon Musk‘s aides “unbridled access” to the data of millions of Americans, and ordered a halt to further record sharing.
U.S. District Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander of Maryland said Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency was intruding into “the personal affairs of millions of Americans” as part of its hunt for fraud and waste under President Donald Trump.
“Really, I want to turn it off and let the courts figure out how they want to run a federal agency,” he said….
Earlier on Thursday, Judge Hollander, in her ruling, said: “To be sure, rooting out possible fraud, waste, and mismanagement in the SSA is in the public interest. But, that does not mean that the government can flout the law to do so.”
The case has shed light for the first time on the amount of personal information DOGE staffers have been given access to in the databases, which hold vast amounts of sensitive data on most Americans.
The SSA administers benefits for tens of millions of older Americans and people with disabilities, and is just one of at least 20 agencies DOGE has accessed since January.
Hollander said at the heart of the case was a decision by new leadership at the SSA to give 10 DOGE staffers unfettered access to the records of millions of Americans. She said lawyers for SSA had acknowledged that agency leaders had given DOGE access to a “massive amount” of records.
“The DOGE Team is essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion. It has launched a search for the proverbial needle in the haystack, without any concrete knowledge that the needle is actually in the haystack,” Hollander said….
One of the systems DOGE accessed is called Numident, or Numerical Identification, known inside the agency as the “crown jewels,” three former and current SSA staffers told Reuters. Numident contains personal information of everyone who has applied for or been given a social security number.
After a new order from Judge Hollander, Dudek has backed down on his threat to shut down the Social Security Administration.
Acting Social Security commissioner Leland Dudek threatened Thursday evening to bar Social Security Administration employees from accessing its computer systems in response to a judge’s order blocking the U.S. DOGE Service from accessing sensitive taxpayer data.
Less than 24 hours later — after the judge rejected his argument and the White House intervened — Dudek is saying he was “out of line.”
Lucy Almey Bird, A good book
Dudek initially told news outlets, including in a Friday interview with The Washington Post, that the judge’s decision to bar sensitive data access to “DOGE affiliates” was overly broad and that to comply, he might have to block virtually all SSA employees from accessing the agency’s computer systems. But Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, who issued the order, said in a letter that Dudek’s assertions “were inaccurate.”
“Employees of SSA who are not involved with the DOGE Team or in the work of the DOGE Team are not subject to the Order,” Hollander wrote in the letter on Friday sent to lawyers involved in the case. “ … Moreover, any suggestion that the Order may require the delay or suspension of benefit payments is incorrect.”
In response to Hollander’s letter, Dudek said in a statement that the court clarified its guidance and “therefore, I am not shutting down the agency.”
Dudek, in a follow-up interview Friday afternoon with The Post, thanked Hollander for the clarification, adding, “The president is committed to keeping the Social Security offices open to serve the public.” He then acknowledged that this was an about-face from his stance in an interview with The Post earlier in the day.
“[The White House] called me and let me know it’s important to reaffirm to the public that we’re open for business,” he said. “The White House did remind me that I was out of line and so did the judge. And I appreciate that.”
Yeah, right. I’m sure King Trump is very concerned about us peons who need Social Security to live.
Hollander issued a two-week temporary restraining order Thursday that prohibits Social Security officials from sharing personally identifiable information with Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service, which has been empowered to carry out cost-cutting across the government.
Hollander, who was appointed by President Barack Obama, wrote that DOGE “essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion” and “never identified or articulated even a single reason for which the DOGE Team needs unlimited access to SSA’s entire record systems.”
To top all that, yesterday a video surfaced of Trump’s Commerce Secretary, billionaire Howard Lutnick, claiming that seniors who missed a social security check wouldn’t miss it and anyone who complained was a “fraudster” “stealing” from the government. I don’t think Lutnick understands that Social Security is funded by the payments made by recipients all of their working lives.
Rachel Maddow spent much of her show last night talking about Lutnick’s clueless statement.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said his 94-year-old mother-in-law wouldn’t be worried if she didn’t receive her Social Security check one month.
Lutnick argued that the only people upset about DOGE head Elon Musk targeting Social Security are fraudsters abusing the system.
“Let’s say Social Security didn’t send out their checks this month. My mother-in-law, who’s 94, wouldn’t call and complain,” he said during a Thursday appearance on the All-In podcast. “She just wouldn’t. She’d think something got messed up and she’ll get it next month.”
Public records suggest that his mother-in-law, Geri Lambert, lives with Lutnick and his wife Allison, at his Upper East Side townhouse in Manhattan. If that is the case, she is unlikely to be relying on Social Security for rent or mortgage payments.
Lutnick, who was nominated to the role by President Donald Trump, amassed a fortune worth around $1.5 billion over more than 30 years as the CEO of the investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald. He stepped down from the position in February when he was confirmed as commerce secretary.
“A fraudster always makes the loudest noise screaming, yelling, and complaining,” the commerce secretary continued. “Elon knows this by heart… The easiest way to find the fraudster is to stop payments and listen, because whoever screams is the one stealing.”
It isn’t the first eyebrow-raising statement Lutnick has made in support of Musk—even this week.
On Wednesday, Lutnick appeared on Fox News and urged viewers to “buy Tesla” stock, which has been plummeting amid protests against Musk’s efforts to reshape the federal government. Musk is the CEO of the electric vehicle manufacturer.
He called Musk “probably the best person to bet on I’ve ever met,” saying: “It’s unbelievable that this guy’s stock is this cheap.”
Advocates warn these sweeping moves could lead to seniors and people with disabilities having a harder time getting help with their crucial benefits.
Already, getting assistance can be burdensome.
“My first phone call that I made to Social Security, I was on hold for 3 hours and 15 minutes before I spoke to somebody,” Aaron Woods, who’s been trying for months to help his mother sort out her Social Security and Medicare benefits, told NPR.
Read more about Woods’ case at the link. These problems existed before DOGE got involved.
For years, advocates say the Social Security Administration has struggled to keep up with its growing workload. Besides retirement services, the agency runs programs that provide survivor benefits and disability benefits and supplemental income for the very poor.
“There simply have not been enough workers to administer the benefits timely,” said Kristen Dama, a managing attorney at Community Legal Services of Philadelphia, which helps people navigate the benefits process. “To make sure that mistakes aren’t made. And then when people get disconnected, whether it’s for financial reasons or for mistakes, there’s just not enough people … to allow recipients to get reconnected easily.”
And problem-solving could get harder as the agency plans to cut 7,000 jobs — though its current staffing of about 57,000 is already at a 50-year low….
The agency also announced it would undergo a massive restructuring by eliminating six out of its 10 regional offices, which Dama said would significantly affect her organization’s ability to sort out problems for her clients.
“For legal aid advocates, both at my organization and across the country, the regional offices are really the fixers, are the quality control, and they play that role also for constituent service staff, social services organizations,” she said. “They are really the place where problems that can’t be solved get escalated.”
There’s much more information at the link. This is a great article.
Veronica Taylor doesn’t know how to turn on a computer, let alone use the internet.
The 73-year-old can’t drive and is mostly housebound in her mountainous and remote West Virginia community, where a simple trip to the grocery store can take an hour by car.
New requirements that Social Security recipients access key benefits online or in person at a field office, rather than on the phone, would be nearly impossible to meet without help.
“If that’s the only way I had to do it, how would I do it?” Taylor said, talking about the changes while eating a plate of green beans, mac and cheese and fried fish with a group of retirees at the McDowell County Senior Center. “I would never get nothing done.”
The requirements, set to go into effect March 31, are intended to streamline processes and combat widespread fraud within the system, according to President Donald Trump and officials in his administration.
Time to Oneself, Marcella Cooper
Bullshit.
They say that’s why it’s vital for people to verify their identity online or in person when signing up for benefits, or making a change like where the money is deposited.
But advocates say the changes will disproportionately impact the most vulnerable Americans. It will be harder to visit field offices in rural areas with high poverty rates. Often these are the same areas that lack widespread internet service.
Many Social Security field offices are also being shut down, part of the federal government’s cost-cutting efforts. That could mean seniors have to travel even farther to visit, including in parts of rural West Virginia.
At least now the efforts to kill Social Security are out in the open. I guarantee you if there is a missed payment the public reaction will shock self-satisfied billionaires like Howard Lutnick, Elon Musk, and Donald Trump.
Meanwhile, Musk is throwing a tantrum about judges who are simply interpreting U.S. laws.
In the days after a federal judge ruled Elon Musk’s dismantling of USAID likely violated the constitution, the world’s richest person issued a series of online attacks against the American judiciary, offered money to voters to sign a petition opposing “activist judges”, and called on Congress to remove his newfound legal opponents from office.
“This is a judicial coup,” Musk wrote on Wednesday, asking lawmakers to “impeach the judges”.
Musk, who serves as a senior adviser to Donald Trump, posted about judges who ruled in opposition to the administration more than 20 times within 48 hours this week on X, the social network he owns, repeatedly framing them as radical leftist activists and seeking to undermine their authority. His denunciations came as his so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) faces sweeping and numerous legal challenges to its gutting overhaul of the government, which has involved firing thousands of workers and gaining access to sensitive government data.
Doge is the subject of nearly two dozen lawsuits, which in some cases have already resulted in judges imposing more transparency on Musk’s initiative or reversing parts of its rapid-fire cuts at federal agencies. The legal pushback poses one of the most significant challenges to Musk’s plans, which for weeks after inauguration day involved operating with expansive powers and little evident oversight.
While Musk posts online, he is also directing some of his immense wealth towards those who support his cause. Musk donated funds to seven Republican members of Congress who called for impeaching judges, the New York Times reported, giving the maximum allowable donation of $6,600 to their campaigns.
Musk also launched a petition on Thursday against “activist judges” via his political action group America Pac, which offered registered voters in Wisconsin $100 if they signed. Musk’s Pac has funneled millions of dollars into the state’s 1 April supreme court race, in which he is backing a former Republican attorney general in another attempt to reshape the country’s courts.
How is that legal? But he got away with it in Pennsylvania during the 2024 election when he offered 1 million prizes for people who signed a petition.
By Laura El
Musk is also furious about “leakers” who have talked to the press about his DOGE meddling.
The pervasive fear and anger that have been rippling through federal agencies over Elon Musk’s slashing approach to shrinking government deepened even further on Friday over the billionaire tech mogul’s threat to root out and punish anyone who is leaking to the media.
They’ve already taken every precaution they can for fear of retaliation: setting Signal messages to automatically disappear, taking photos of documents they share instead of screenshotting, using non-government devices to communicate. But disclosing the chaos caused by Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, for many, outweighs the risks that come with leaking.
Following Thursday’s New York Times report that Musk was set to receive a Pentagon briefing about a confidential contingency plan for a war with China, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO posted on his social media platform X that leakers “will be found” and, he intimated, punished.
“I look forward to the prosecutions of those at the Pentagon who are leaking maliciously false information to NYT,” Musk wrote in his post.
Oooooh! How scary!
But Musk’s post is not having the chilling effect on leakers he’d intended, according to conversations with more than half a dozen government employees who had previously spoken to POLITICO. If anything, it might be the other way around.
“We are public servants, not Elon’s servants,” said one Food and Drug Administration employee who, like all people interviewed for this story, was granted anonymity to speak candidly about internal dynamics. “The public deserves to know how dysfunctional, destructive, and deceptive all of this has been and continues to be.”
“Leakers are patriots,” said one Agriculture Department employee. Helping the media report on problems or concerns inside agencies, the USDA employee added, is motivated by a desire for greater transparency — the same goal Musk has said undergirds his own work through DOGE….
Musk’s comments may not have caused a major shift in how federal workers view sharing information with reporters, one federal employee at a health agency said, citing group chats with other employees.
But even before Musk’s comments this week, the prevailing atmosphere inside many federal agencies — from constant threats of firing and being labeled enemies of the public to ousting them for following orders from previous administrations — have left employees feeling vulnerable, increasingly incensed and concerned about their physical safety.
There’s quite a bit more at the Politico link.
By Rakhmeet Redzhepov
Musk is also paying a price in attitudes toward his EV company Tesla. He and his rich buddies think attacks on Tesla locations and individual cars is a conspiracy, but it is really organic. Let me say up front that I don’t condone violence or vandalism.
Law enforcement officials and domestic extremism experts say they have found no evidence that a series of attacks on Tesla vehicles and dealerships are coordinated despite such claims from Tesla CEO Elon Musk and President Donald Trump.
At least 10 Tesla dealerships, charging stations and facilities have been hit by vandals, many of whom have lit cars on fire, while a growing collection of videos posted to social media have shown people defacing and damaging Tesla vehicles. One website appeared to encourage people to target Tesla vehicles, publishing a map with the information of dozens of Tesla owners and Tesla facilities. It’s unknown who started the site.
The attacks have come as Musk has emerged as one of the brightest flashpoints of an already tumultuous second Trump administration, leading a sweeping effort to cut large swaths of the federal government. Musk has decried the attacks on Teslas, and on Thursday claimed on his social media platform X that the attacks were “coordinated.” He did not provide evidence….
Trump has also claimed the attacks have been coordinated. In an interview Wednesday on Fox News, he said without evidence that “people that are very highly political on the left” are paying the vandals.
Trump has called the destruction of Tesla property domestic terrorism, and Attorney General Pam Bondi announced charges on Thursday against three people accused of vandalizing Tesla properties in Oregon, South Carolina and Washington state.
Publicly available court documents for the three people make no mention of coordination, an NBC News review found.
Experts and law enforcement officials nationwide from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the two federal agencies investigating the attacks, all told NBC News they have found no evidence of any coordination around the attacks.
More details at NBC News.
I’m just heartened by the rising public anger over Trump and Musk working to destroy our democratic form of government and turn our country into a dictatorship.
Entering the magnificent great hall of the US Department of Justice, Donald Trump stopped for a moment to admire his portrait then took to a specially constructed stage where two art deco statues, depicting the “Spirit of Justice” and “Majesty of Justice”, had been carefully concealed behind a blue velvet curtain.
The president, who since last year is also a convicted criminal, proceeded to air grievances, utter a profanity and accuse the news media of doing “totally illegal” things, without offering evidence. “I just hope you can all watch for it,” he told justice department employees, “but it’s totally illegal.”
Cat Lady on a Couch, by Sharon Bursic
Trump’s breach of the justice department’s traditional independence last week was neither shocking nor surprising. His speech quickly faded from the fast and furious news cycle. But future historians may regard it as a milestone on a road leading the world’s oldest continuousdemocracy to a once unthinkable destination.
Eviscerating the federal government and subjugating Congress; defying court orders and delegitimising judges; deporting immigrants and arresting protesters without due process; chilling free speech at universities and cultural institutions; cowing news outlets with divide-and-rule. Add a rightwing media ecosystem manufacturing consent and obeyance in advance, along with a weak and divided opposition offering feeble resistance. Join all the dots, critics say, and America is sleepwalking into authoritarianism.
“These are flashing red lights here,” Tara Setmayer, a former Republican communications director turned Trump critic. “We are approaching Defcon 1 for our democracy and a lot of people in the media and the opposition leadership don’t seem to be communicating that to the American people. That is the biggest danger of the moment we’re in now: the normalisation of it.”
Much was said and written by journalists and Democrats during last year’s election campaign arguing that Trump, who instigated a coup against the US government on January 6, 2021, could endanger America’s 240-year experiment with democracy if he returned to power. In a TV interview he had promised to be “dictator” but only on “day one”. Sixty days in, the only question is whether the warnings went far enough.
The 45th and 47th president has wasted no time in launching a concerted effort to consolidate executive power, undermine checks and balances and challenge established legal and institutional norms. And he is making no secret of his strongman ambitions.
Trump, 78, has declared “We are the federal law” and posted a social media image of himself wearing a crown with the words “Long live the king”. He also channeled Napoleon with the words: “He who saves his country does not violate any law.” And JD Vance has stated that “judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power”.
Trump quickly pardoned those who attacked the US Capitol on January 6, placed loyalists in key positions within the FBI and military and purged the justice department, which also suffered resignations in response to the dismissal of corruption charges against New York mayor Eric Adams after his cooperation on hardline immigration measures.
The president now has the courts in his sights. Last weekend the White House defied a judge’s verbal order blocking it from invoking the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 law meant only to be used in wartime, to justify the deportation of 250 Venezuelan alleged gang members to El Salvador, where they will be held in a 40,000-person megaprison.
Read the rest at The Guardian.
That’s it for me today. What’s on your mind?
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I have a nasty cold, so I don’t know how much I can do today. As always, everything is endlessly crazy. Trump is causing chaos with his on-again, off-again tariffs, but I’m not going to deal with that today. I want to begin with the latest on Social Security. There is quite a bit of news on it today. Next, news on the spreading Measles outbreak and then the possible government shutdown.
Since the arrival of a team from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, Social Security is in a far more precarious place than has been widely understood, according to Leland Dudek, the acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration. “I don’t want the system to collapse,” Dudek said in a closed-door meeting last week, according to a recording obtained by ProPublica. He also said that it “would be catastrophic for the people in our country” if DOGE were to make changes at his agency that were as sweeping as those at USAID, the Treasury Department and elsewhere.
Dudek’s comments, delivered to a group of senior staff and Social Security advocates attending both in person and virtually, offer an extraordinary window into the thinking of a top agency official in the volatile early days of the second Trump administration. The Washington Post first reported Dudek’s acknowledgement that DOGE is calling the shots at Social Security and quoted several of his statements. But the full recording reveals that he went much further, citing not only the actions being taken at the agency by the people he repeatedly called “the DOGE kids,” but also extensive input he has received from the White House itself. When a participant in the meeting asked him why he wouldn’t more forcefully call out President Donald Trump’s continued false claims about widespread Social Security fraud as “BS,” Dudek answered, “So we published, for the record, what was actually the numbers there on our website. This is dealing with — have you ever worked with someone who’s manic-depressive?”
Throughout the meeting, Dudek made alarming statements about the perils facing the Social Security system, but he did so in an oddly informal, discursive manner. It left several participants baffled as to the ultimate fate of the nation’s largest and most popular social program, one that serves 73 million Americans. “Are we going to break something?” Dudek asked at one point, referring to what DOGE has been doing with Social Security data. “I don’t know.”
But then he said, in a more reassuring tone: “They’re learning. Let people learn. They’re going to make mistakes.”
Dudek embodies the dramatic whipsawing of life as a public servant under DOGE. For 25 years, he was the ultimate faceless bureaucrat: a midlevel analyst who had bounced between federal agencies, ultimately landing at the Social Security Administration and focusing on information technology, cybersecurity and fraud prevention. He was largely unknown even within the agency. But in February, he suddenly vaulted into the public eye when he was put on leave for surreptitiously sharing information with DOGE. It appeared that he might lose his job, but then he was unexpectedly promoted by the Trump administration to the position of acting commissioner. At the time, he seemed unreservedly committed to the DOGE agenda, writing — then deleting — a bellicose LinkedIn post in which he expressed pride in having “bullied agency executives, shared executive contact information, and circumvented the chain of command to connect DOGE with the people who get stuff done.”
Now, only weeks into his tenure, he was taking a far more ambivalent posture toward not just DOGE but Trump. On multiple occasions during last week’s meeting, according to the recording, Dudek framed the choices that he has been making in recent weeks as “the president’s” agenda. These choices have included planned cuts of at least 7,000 Social Security employees; buyouts and early retirement offered to the entire staff of 57,000, including those who work in field offices and teleservice centers helping elderly and disabled people navigate the program; cuts to disability determination services; the dissolution of a team that had been working to improve the user experience of the ssa.gov website and application process; a reduction of the agency’s footprint across the country from 10 regional offices to four; the terminations of 64 leases, including those for some field office and hearing office space; proposals to outsource Social Security customer service; and more.
“I work for the president. I need to do what the president tells me to do,” Dudek said, according to the recording. “I’ve had to make some tough choices, choices I didn’t agree with, but the president wanted it and I did it,” he added later. (He didn’t name specific actions that Trump did or did not direct.)
These assaults on the SSA threaten Americans’ ability to access the benefits they rely on to get by.
The Social Security Administration has been doing more with less for years, providing benefits to a rapidly growing number of beneficiaries despite its shrinking staff. Under congressional restrictions on administrative spending, agency capacity has stretched to the breaking point, with staff levels approaching a 25-year low in fiscal year 2024. Under these conditions, former Social Security Commissioner Martin O’Malley warned that DOGE-led cuts to an already skeletal agency may lead to “system collapse and an interruption of benefits.”
Any delay or interruption in payments would be catastrophic. More than 7 million Americans 65 and older receive at least 90 percent of their income from Social Security.* For many of these seniors, even a few days’ delay in receiving Social Security benefits would pose an immediate threat to their ability to pay rent and buy food. Payments made even later, or missed, would irreparably harm many more: In a January 2025 survey, 42 percent of Americans 65 and older reported “I would not be able to afford the basics, such as food, clothing, or housing [without Social Security retirement benefits].”
Disabled people and their families, likewise, would face dire straits. More than 11 million disabled Americans under the age of 65 rely on benefits administered by the SSA through either Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), Supplemental Security Income (SSI), or both. Most SSDI recipients can’t work due to their disability, while others work limited hours and can only earn very limited amounts without forfeiting their benefits. For SSI claimants, even when they are able to work, they can only hold a few thousand dollars in gross assets without losing their benefits, subject to limited exceptions, making it essentially impossible to save. As a result, too many SSDI and SSI recipients are one missed or late payment away from not making rent or putting food on the table.
President Trump and his billionaire adviser Elon Musk are ratcheting up false rhetoric about Social Security, repeatedly claiming the program wastes hundreds of billions of dollars in fraudulent payouts that need to be eliminated.
Their position is confounding experts and worrying advocates, who fear the claims are a pretext for massive cuts to the program down the road.
In an interview Monday with Larry Kudlow, who served as Trump’s chief economic adviser in his first term, Musk suggested Social Security and other entitlement programs are rife with fraud and a prime target for cuts.
“Most of the federal spending is entitlements. So that’s the big one to eliminate,” Musk said on Kudlow’s Fox Business show, adding there’s possibly $500 billion to $700 billion in potential cuts there.
Musk also said they’re trying to put a stop to “stolen” and “fake” Social Security numbers.
What’s their evidence for this fraud and waste?
Economists say the levels of fraud talked about by Trump and Musk just don’t exist.
A report by the Social Security Administration’s inspector general last year found the agency made nearly $72 billion in improper payments from fiscal 2015 through fiscal 2022 — less than 1 percent of benefits paid out during that period.
“I’m a firm believer in the perpetual inefficiency of government. But if I had to pick one place in the federal government that is more efficient than most, Social Security would be one of them,” said Chuck Blahous, a senior research strategist at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University and a former top economic adviser in the George W. Bush administration.
Representatives from DOGE have reportedly gained access to sensitive taxpayer data collected by the Social Security Administration (SSA).
According to a declaration in a federal lawsuit from Tiffany Flick, the SSA’s former acting chief of staff, DOGE staffers seemed to want the data to search for evidence of alleged benefits fraud.
Flick wrote that she thought the DOGE team’s concerns were “invalid and based on an inaccurate understanding of SSA’s data and programs.”
Musk also claims that “illegal” immigrants are getting Social Security benefits. Of course, that’s impossible, since these people can’t get Social Security numbers.
Democratic Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Ron Wyden of Oregon are warning Frank Bisignano, the nominee to lead the Social Security Administration, that he will be responsible if staff cuts interfere with the agency’s ability to process and disburse benefit checks.
President Donald Trump has nominated Bisignano, chief executive of payments and financial technology company Fiserv, to serve as commissioner of the agency, which is responsible for sending monthly benefit payments to more than 72 million Americans.
“As President Trump’s nominee for SSA Commissioner, you will be responsible if the Trump Administration’s attacks on the program result in failures or delays in getting Americans their Social Security checks — in other words, a backdoor cut to benefits,” Warren and Wyden wrote in a March 11 letter to Bisignano, shared exclusively with CNBC.
Bisignano’s Senate confirmation hearing is expected to take place later this month, according to a source familiar with the situation.
In the interim, the agency is under the leadership of acting commissioner Lee Dudek, who according to reports publicly stated before his appointment that he had been put on administrative leave after helping representatives of Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency. Dudek replaced former acting commissioner Michelle King, who stepped down following reported disagreements with DOGE over access to sensitive data.
The Measles Outbreak
Measles is spreading around the country, and RFK Jr. isn’t dealing with what’s happening.
Los Angeles County in California, Suffolk County in New York and Howard County in Maryland detected their first confirmed cases of measles this year, while Oklahoma reported two possible cases, local health authorities said this week.
The spread of the highly infectious disease comes as an outbreak of more than 200 cases has continued to grow in Texas, and as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned health-care workers and potential travelers to “be vigilant” ahead of spring and summer travel.
Health officials in Los Angeles County — the most populous county in the United States — reported a case Tuesday in a resident who may have been exposed onboard a China Airlines flight that landed at Los Angeles International Airport on March 5.
The New York state health department announced on Tuesday its first known case of measles outside New York City this year. The patient, who under 5 years old, lives in Suffolk County on Long Island.
In Howard County, just west of Baltimore, health authorities on Sunday reported a confirmed case in a resident who recently traveled abroad and was at Washington Dulles International Airport on March 5.
Two individuals in Oklahoma reported symptoms consistent with measles and had potential exposure to outbreaks in Texas and New Mexico, the Oklahoma Health Department said Tuesday. It praised the individuals for “immediately excluding themselves from public settings.” [….]
In Canada, at least 146 confirmed cases have been detected this year up to March 6, along with 22 probable cases.
Health officials in Philadelphia are warning residents of potential exposures to the highly infectious measles virus at multiple health facilities in the city over the past week.
The person exposed to the virus was present at the following locations in the city at these times, according to the Philadelphia Department of Public Health:
The South Philadelphia Health and Literacy Center, 1700 South Broad Street. The building includes the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Pediatric Primary Care unit in South Philadelphia, the health department’s Health Center No. 2 and the South Philadelphia library, but no one in the library is at risk.
The person was in the building on Friday, March 7, between 10:45 a.m. and 2:40 p.m. The next day on March 8, the person was there between 9:05 a.m. and 1:20 p.m.
The CHOP Emergency room at 3401 Civic Center Boulevard on Monday, March 10 between 7:55 a.m. and 10:15 a.m.
A case of measles has been confirmed in a Los Angeles County resident who recently traveled through the Los Angeles International airport, the county’s Department of Public Health announced in a statement Tuesday.
It is the first confirmed case of measles in a LA County resident in 2025, according to the department.
Passengers assigned to specific seats that may have been exposed on China Airlines flight CAL8/ CI8 that arrived in Los Angeles on March 5 will be notified by local departments of health in collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control.
Additionally, individuals who were at the following locations on the specified dates and times may be at risk of developing measles due to exposure to this individual:
— Wednesday, March 5 between 7 p.m. to 10:40 p.m.: Tom Bradley International Terminal (Terminal B) at the Los Angeles International (LAX) Airport
— Friday, March 7, between 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.: Cloud 9 Nail Salon, 5142 N. Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood, CA 91601
— Monday, March 10 between 8:15 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.: Superior Grocery Store, 10683 Valley Blvd., El Monte, CA 91731
So what is the head of Health and Human Services doing?
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared to suggest getting measles is the best defense against the disease, as a Texas outbreak spreads across the U.S.
More than 220 people in the state have been diagnosed with the infectious virus, and California, New York, and Maryland have also reported cases of late. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is sweating over the outbreak, warning health-care workers and travelers to “be vigilant.”
While RFK Jr. recently shifted his stance to concede that vaccinations are actually pretty useful, he has still stopped short of urging skeptics to go and get it. And in an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity that aired Tuesday night, he appeared to still favor natural immunity through exposure to the virus.
“It used to be, when I were a kid, that everybody got measles. And the measles gave you lifetime protection against measles infection,” he said, then taking a swipe at the vaccine. “The vaccine doesn’t do that. The vaccine is effective for some people for life, but for many people it wanes.”
In Texas, uptake of the vaccine is lower than in other states, partly fueled by COVID skepticism. The measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine offers 93 percent protection against measles if the recipient has one dose, and 97 percent after two doses, according to the CDC.
HuffPost via Yahoo News: RFK Jr. Makes More Alarming Comments About Measles Amid U.S. Outbreaks.
In an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity broadcast Tuesday, Kennedy said “natural immunity” after getting a measles infection is more effective at providing lasting protection against the disease. However, Kennedy left out that the dangers of catching the disease outweigh the advantage of immunity, according to doctors….
Despite Kennedy’s claims, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the majority of people who have had the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) and the measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella (MMRV) vaccines will be protected for life. The CDC also has guidance for people it recommends should be revaccinated.
Prior to the introduction of the vaccine in 1963, about 500,000 cases and 500 measles deaths were reported annually, while the real number of cases was suspected to be much higher, the agency said. Since then, incidence of the disease has fallen by over 95%, it said.
Kennedy added that he would make sure that “anybody who wants a vaccine can get one,” noting that he is against forcing people to take it.
“I’m a freedom of choice person,” Kennedy said. “We should have transparency. We should have informed choice. And — but if people don’t want it, the government shouldn’t force them to do it. There are adverse events from the vaccine. It does cause deaths every year. It causes all the illnesses that measles itself cause.”
The CDC has stressed the measles vaccine is safe and effective. Its website lists extensive information about the vaccine, including potential side effects and warnings for people who shouldn’t get vaccinated.
Government Shutdown
Yesterday, the House passed their continuing resolution with devastating cuts to Medicaid. Now, Democrats in the Senate have to decide whether to filibuster and possibly shut down the government.
Democrats were actually quite pleased with the clown show that was Congress in the last two years. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) had no ability to pass anything without Democratic votes, as he was simply not in control of the far-right elements of his caucus. Democrats welcomed the perception that they were government’s rescuers, the adults in the room, who would save Johnson’s bacon and functionally control the House.
This is no longer true. Donald Trump’s looming presence has whipped Republicans in line, and Johnson has recognized an important truth: So-called “moderate” Republicans will swallow anything, so he only has to negotiate with the far right, and if he can satisfy them, he’ll win any vote. Such was the case with a partisan seven-month “continuing resolution” that passed the House on Tuesday 217-213, with only one defection by libertarian Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who doesn’t really believe in government funding at all. (One Democrat voted for it, Maine Blue Dog Jared Golden.)
It is somewhat remarkable that dozens of House Republicans who have vowed never to pass stopgap bills to fund the government in their political careers caved on this one. But that’s why I put “continuing resolution” in quotes. In reality, this is a hastily arranged partisan Republican budget that achieves much of their anti-government, anti-immigrant, pro-military agenda while paving the way for Trump to nullify whatever spending he deems unworthy. It doesn’t just tilt spending in a far-right direction, it actually abdicates congressional responsibility as the branch of government that makes federal spending decisions.
Yet several Senate Democrats are thinking about passing it anyway.
Without the luxury of Republicans falling apart, Democrats in the Senate need to decide whether to prevent a dangerous and harmful budget that shrinks the power of Congress in the government. Since operating on principle goes against their “adults in the room” mindset, they are wavering on what to do. But it should be an open-and-shut case.
A normal continuing resolution funds the government at the same level as the previous budget. This bill does not. It cuts non-defense discretionary spending by $13 billion below last year’s level, while increasing military spending by $6 billion. It zeroes out funding for programs that fund homeless shelters and prevent child abuse. It cuts health care funding for clinics and hospitals, emergency preparedness for communities, clean water projects, and tribal assistance. Meanwhile, it adds money for mass deportations, just as Immigration and Customs Enforcement has illegally detained a green card holder for his political beliefs.
Over the last week a few TPM Readers have written in with contrary arguments about how to deal with the “continuing resolution” that just passed the House and will soon be voted on in the Senate. These weren’t critical or acrimonious letters but frank constructive counters, which I appreciate. I wanted to discuss them because they line up pretty closely with the arguments that seem to have strong advocates in the Senate Democratic caucus.
Let me summarize them briefly.
Democrats are in a tough messaging environment and they’ll get blamed for the shutdown. Trump might even get to blame a recession on them.
The White House will get to control the pace of the shutdown. In other words, the executive gets flexibility in just how things get shut down, things that will get more or less helpful press attention. Thus he’ll be able to engineer lots of bad press cycles for the Democrats.
Quite simply, Trump’s presidency and the economy are imploding. Why rush in to make ourselves the story when every day is a bad day for Trump?
It’s too soon. The public isn’t engaged enough yet. By the fall the economy will likely be in recession and it will be a debate on Medicare, Medicaid, etc. — that’s the time to have the fight.
Trump and Musk probably want a shutdown. After a shutdown goes on for 30 days, the law opens up new legal avenues for layoffs. A shutdown is actually what they want and they will use it to accelerate the process, get people used to it. In other words, risking a shutdown is a trap because nothing would make them happier.
I’ve thought a lot about each of these arguments. On their own a number of them are compelling and point to very real risks. Indeed, last week I briefly started questioning my own position because Democrats had done nothing to lay any groundwork for why they were choosing this confrontation. And that makes a fight much, much harder.
But I think each of these arguments is mistaken. Indeed, as a whole it’s a bit like sitting in the mess hall in Treblinka planning an escape when someone says, “But if we try to escape they’ll kill us all!”
First, I think Republicans are going to get wrecked in the midterms. I think that’s highly likely whatever happens. As a narrowly electoral calculus I think there’s a decent argument Democrats should just let everything happen, let Trump and Musk go wild. In this sense, James Carville’s argument that Democrats should just do nothing is right, by a narrowly electoral calculus. But there’s more than just an electoral calculus. Trump and Musk are methodically dismantling the republic day by day. Absent some major change in the trajectory of events the government Democrats might half-inherit in a midterm sweep would be all but unrecognizable, a smoldering heap of faits accompli. Democrats need to take some real risks to at least slow the process of destruction and reshape the trajectory.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed a continuing resolution to keep the government funded through September 30 and avert a government shutdown on Friday. Now, the bill moves to the Senate, where, if Democrats want to stop Donald Trump’s assault on the federal government, they must filibuster it.
I get that the politics of this are complicated, but this isn’t even a close call.
First, Republicans didn’t even bother negotiating with Democrats on this bill. As a result, there are no provisions requiring Trump to actually spend the money Congress is appropriating. This is important because Trump and Elon Musk have run roughshod over congressional prerogatives for the past two months, slashing government spending that Congress has already appropriated.
Republicans are, in effect, daring Democrats to block it and risk taking the blame for a government shutdown (that’s how Speaker Mike Johnson got all but one of his fractured caucus to vote for the bill). On the merits, the bill is bad but not egregiously awful. It keeps spending levels essentially flat while increasing defense spending by $6 billion. However, it would force the District of Columbia to cut its budget by more than $1 billion, which would be devastating. In addition, it includes a provision that strips the House of the ability to stop Trump’s recent declarations of national emergencies on immigration and the border, which has allowed him to place sweeping tariffs on Canada and Mexico.
But the real problem with the House-passed CR is that if Democrats allow it to become law, they will be handing Trump and Musk a blank check and the congressional authority to wreak further havoc on the federal government.
Handing Trump more money — with no provision for how he spends it — is an explicit surrender to his and Musk’s lawlessness. Unlike regular spending bills, continuing resolutions do not explicitly tell the executive branch how it should allocate the money appropriated. So, if Senate Democrats allow this bill to pass, they would give Trump even greater discretion in how he spends money authorized by Congress — and more congressional leeway for taking a wrecking ball to the federal government.
This is a bizarre situation in which the president of the United States and this billionaire are already shutting down the government. So if I’m a Democrat in Congress, why do I vote for a continuing resolution to fund programs that are not continuing? It really is just a blank check. It’s like giving Trump and Musk a trillion dollars and saying, Spend it as you like.
Democrats cannot be complicit in Trump and Musk’s evisceration of the federal government. Even if Senate Republicans try to eliminate the filibuster to thwart Democrats’ shutdown tactics, even if Trump ignores Congress and (unconstitutionally) keeps the government open, and even if an extended shutdown boomerangs politically against Democrats, Democrats still need to hold the line.
Click the link to read the rest.
That’s it for me today. What’s on your mind?
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