DOGE dopes may have dumped your Social Security number and info onto the internet

Whistleblower Warns of Possible Risks to Americans’ Social Security Information 

The Government Accountability Project submitted a protected whistleblower disclosure to the Office of Special Counsel and congressional committees with grave allegations of data security lapses that put over 300 million Americans’ social security information at risk. 

Whistleblower Charles Borges, the Chief Data Officer (CDO) at the Social Security Administration (SSA), disclosed reports that Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) officials employed by SSA have created a live copy of the country’s Social Security information in a cloud environment that circumvents oversight. 

Should bad actors gain access to this cloud environment, Americans may be susceptible to widespread identity theft, lose vital healthcare and food benefits, and the government could be responsible for re-issuing every American a new Social Security number. 

Charles Borges began serving as the CDO of SSA and leading the Office of Analytics, Review, and Oversight on January 27, 2025, responsible for the safety, integrity, and security of the public’s data at SSA. His position requires full visibility into data access, data exchange, and cloud-based environments. 

Since DOGE’s founding in January 2025, DOGE officials have sought to access the American public’s Social Security data, purportedly to address claims of fraud. A lawsuit was filed to stop DOGE’s access to the data which resulted in the court issuing a temporary restraining order on March 20, 2025 that was in effect until June 6, 2025. 

Mr. Borges’ disclosure describes multiple instances of wrongdoing at SSA progressing from a circumvention of the court’s order in March 2025 to approval of high-risk activities outside of normal review and approval procedures by July 2025. 

Mr. Borges details how DOGE personnel appeared to have given themselves authorization to create a copy of SSA’s entire live set of data on the American public without any independent security or oversight mechanisms in place. 

Senator Whitehouse warns of $500 billion in mandatory Medicare cuts hidden in Trump's Big, Beautiful Bill

"Republicans took a bank shot at Medicare"

Steve Ahlquist

United States Senator Sheldon Whitehouse joined Pawtucket Mayor Donald Grebien, Rhode Island Office of Healthy Aging Director Maria Cimini, and dozens of seniors at Pawtucket’s Leon Mathieu Senior Center to highlight the hidden Medicare cuts resulting from the recently passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

“I’m here to talk about what I consider to be the three pillars of economic security for most Americans: Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security,” said Senator Whitehouse. “The Trump administration is making a move against each of them. 

We know about the Medicaid cuts because Republicans passed what I call the Big, Beautiful for Billionaires Bill, which cuts hundreds of millions of dollars from Medicaid. Republicans were tricky about it, so they moved the cuts for people until after the next election, so you’re not going to see the cuts until then. 

Who will see the cuts? Hospitals, nursing homes, health centers, and everybody who has to plan for next year’s funding. Women & Infants Hospital is already anxious about what will happen to its finances, and it’s not like our hospitals and healthcare providers are doing great already. There’s already talk about a healthcare crisis in Rhode Island, and these looming Medicaid cuts will make it worse.

“What they’re doing to Social Security is trying to bolex up its operations. They sent in DOGE [Department of Government Efficiency] to damage the operation of Social Security, and drive out the people who work there, make the trains run on time, and make the systems work. They’ve messed around in the computer systems, and they're continuing to put pressure on people to leave.

To me, their plan is to so disable the administration of Social Security that at some point, they don’t make payments, even if it’s briefly. Then they say, ‘Aha, there’s been a foul-up in Social Security. We need to take it over,’ and in will come the private equity folks and tech bros. It’s a backdoor way to privatize Social Security - by creating an emergency that you can then send in your private sector billionaire friends to solve. They then get access to all that data about people. They get access to all that money in the Social Security accounts.

“The third one we’re here to talk about today is Medicare. I suspect everybody here depends on Medicare. Now, there’s no mention of Medicare in the Big, Beautiful for Billionaires Bill, but if you know how a pool table works, there’s something called a bank shot. You don’t go directly at it, you bounce it off the bumper. Republicans took a bank shot at Medicare because they know there’s an existing law that says if you run up the debt so much, mandatory cuts to all sorts of things across the board are triggered, one of which is Medicare.

“Republicans added over $4 trillion to the debt in the Big, Beautiful Bill. That number is so big that it triggers the rule that requires cuts to Medicare. They don’t mention Medicare in the bill, but they also don’t prevent these cuts. It is on automatic pilot, which we want to prevent. That’s why people like me are going around the country pointing this out - so Republicans will realize they made a bad mistake and will back off so we can get them to protect Medicare instead of taking this bank shot to hit Medicare.

Despite assurances, Trump chips away at Americans’ earned Social Security benefits.

Trump’s Continuing War on Social Security

Martin Burns and Mary Liz Burns for Common Dreams

Despite Donald Trump’s assurances that he will not touch Social Security (or Medicare or Medicaid for that matter), his war against Social Security marches on step by step. 

Politico reported last week that “Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Wednesday framed the president’s new ‘Trump accounts’ as a transformative tool for long-term wealth building and a ‘backdoor for privatizing Social Security.’” 

Not surprisingly, Bessent walked back his comments and Trump defenders put out statements pointing to Trump’s promises to defend Social Security.

While many are quite understandably focused on the macro level, the Trump administration is making it harder for Social Security beneficiaries to access their benefits. 

Last week, the Social Security Administration (SSA) announced that beneficiaries will not be able to perform simple tasks on the phone, such as change their address or check the status of their benefits. Instead, people are forced to go online to verify their identity or visit an already-overburdened Social Security field office.

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All of this might seem familiar to you. Earlier this year, SSA announced similar rules only to have to back off after an uproar from Congress and advocacy groups. Guessing that this fleeting retreat offered them an opportunity, SSA put forth these similar rules in midsummer hoping that people were not paying attention. 

Don’t Believe Trump’s Disinformation Campaign About His Budget Bill and Social Security

Trump's bill DOES NOT eliminate income tax on Social Security but DOES undercut the program's financial stability

Martin Burns and Mary Liz Burns for Common Dreams

Over the summer, GOP members of Congress and the Trump administration—particularly Donald Trump—will try to sell the American people on his “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB). One of the claims that will be made is that the legislation ends taxes on Social Security. Ending taxation of Social Security benefits was one of the major campaign promises made by Trump when he was campaigning for reelection.

Contrary to claims made by the White House, the president himself, and GOP members of Congress, the OBBB does not end taxation of Social Security. 

As MSNBC reporting points out, it is procedurally impossible to enact changes in Social Security through the process of reconciliation:

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First and foremost, the idea that the megabill (OBBB) eliminates federal taxes on Social Security—a claim Trump has made repeatedly of late—is plainly false. In fact, congressional Republicans relied on the budget reconciliation process to advance the package, and it’s procedurally impossible to change Social Security through this complex process.

Take a moment to let this fact register with you. It is impossible to enact the kind of Social Security changes that Trump and his supporters claim.

Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” Is Speeding Up Social Security Insolvency

The cuts could be as deep as $18,000 per year for a typical married couple, the report found.

By Chris Walker , Truthout

A new report examining the effects of Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA) shows that it will cause Social Security funds to be depleted more quickly, resulting in significant benefit cuts for new retirees starting in the next decade.

The analysis from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan watchdog group that provides insight and advice on federal spending measures, finds that there is “only a little more than seven years” until the Social Security trust fund reaches insolvency.

Concerns over the solvency of Social Security have been discussed for quite some time. However, OBBBA accelerates the rate at which insolvency will be reached, the report pointed out, stating:

The law dictates that when the trust funds deplete their reserves, payments are limited to incoming revenues. For the Social Security retirement program, we estimate that means a 24 percent benefit cut in late 2032, after the enactment of OBBBA.

For the average dual-income couple retiring in 2033, those cuts would amount to more than $18,000 in fewer benefits annually.

The bill will accelerate depletion of Social Security and Medicare’s trust funds by a year, according to an analysis.

Trump frequently promised during the 2024 presidential campaign that he wouldn’t touch Social Security. Yet this outcome is exactly what the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget predicted in October 2024, with the organization stating that Trump’s tax and economic proposals would lead to benefit cuts within six years.

New Pell Center poll shows little overlap between RI Republicans and Democrats on the health of U.S. democracy, the economy, and immigration policy.

Dan McKee's approval rating continues to tank

Pell Center, Salve Regina University 

Download full report here. 

Well over half of registered voters in Rhode Island believe the United States democracy is not healthy, though the level of concern varies by political party, according to a new survey from Salve Regina University’s Pell Center. 

The survey was directed by Pell Center Associate Director and Fellow Katie Sonder and fielded by Embold Research between June 16-22, 2025.  It gathered responses from 804 registered voters in Rhode Island, with a modeled margin of error of 3.6 percent. 

Survey respondents are those registered to vote in Rhode Island who voted in the 2024 presidential election. The survey results show large divides between the major political parties, highlighting two very different lived realties between Democrats and Republicans.

Over half of registered Democrats agree that the United States is operating as a democracy, but 80% say it is not healthy and 94% believe we are facing a constitutional crisis. Democrats perceive a decline in the strength of the checks and balance system, which likely bolsters their sense of democratic backsliding. Only one-third (32%) agree the system is strong while 64% agree that country has fallen into dictatorship. 

Republicans, on the other hand, are seven times more likely to agree that our democracy is healthy than they were in the June 2024 Voices of Value survey. Well over three-quarters of Republicans (83%) say policies from the Trump administration have helped them personally and the percent who agree that polarization has increased dropped by 15 percentage points between June 2024 (86%) and June 2025 (71%).

While all respondents tapped disinformation and fake news as a leading contributor to political polarization, just as they did in the June 2024 survey, the percent who believe political leaders add to the schism has increased. 

Trump Justices rule the DOGE kids can have access to your Social Security files

"This action by six far-right justices is an affront to every principle of government transparency and the rule of law."

Jon Queally for Common Dreams

Photo by Steven Chan

Defenders of Social Security are responding with critical anger to a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday that side with the Trump administration in a legal battle over access to sensitive data of tens of millions of Americans by the Department of Government Efficiency, the government-eviscerating agency first spearheaded by right-wing libertarian and mega-billionaire Elon Musk.

The unsigned emergency order from the court came in response to an emergency application from the Trump administration defending DOGE's ability to have access to Social Security databases that two labor unions, alongside the Alliance for Retired Americans, had file a legal suit to protect. By its ruling, the Supreme Court stayed a lower federal court's ruling that said DOGE must "disgorge" and "delete" any of the data it accessed or downloaded from the agency files.

While the underlying case plays out, DOGE is now authorized to retain the data and access to the information, which critics say cannot be entrusted to the newly-created department and unvetted personnel who control it.

Trump and Musk's snipe hunt for Social Security fraud

Musk hunt for Social Security fraud is a sham

Jake Johnson for Common Dreams

Tesla cyber truck crash WITHOUT Elon Musk in it

An internal Trump administration document reportedly shows that anti-fraud checks recently installed at the Social Security agency have found just two cases of potentially improper benefit claims out of more than 110,000—a rate of 0.0018%.

The documents, first reported Thursday by Nextgov/FCW, further undercut Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk's narrative that Social Security is brimming with fraud. Musk falsely claimed in March that "40% of the calls into Social Security were fraudulent."

The anti-fraud checks for Social Security have been applied only to benefit claims made over the phone. According to the internal document, "No significant fraud has been detected from the flagged cases." Earlier this year, amid widespread outrage, the Social Security Administration (SSA) walked back a proposal to scrap many of its phone-based benefit claim services.

Nextgov/FCW noted Thursday that the Trump administration's deployment of the anti-fraud tools beginning last month "did cause delays, as SSA changed its phone procedures to add the checks on the backend."

Immigrants are no threat to Social Security - in fact, we need them in the system

Immigration Can Help Save Social Security

By Mitchell Zimmerman

Two-thirds of seniors would lose most of their income if Social Security payments ceased. One in seven have essentially no other income — and if their already modest Social Security checks are reduced, they’ll go hungry.

But Social Security is in trouble.

The number of people reaching retirement age has been growing faster than the number of workers contributing, and Social Security has been running in the red for the last 15 years. The shortfall is projected to drain the Social Security trust fund entirely in just eight years, which could lead to massive benefit cuts.

How can this calamity be avoided? One answer is to lift the cap on income taxed for Social Security. That would ensure wealthier Americans pay into Social Security at the same rate that working and middle class Americans have to.

Another is simply to welcome more immigrants — and stop deporting the law-abiding people who’ve already settled here. Since a growing shortage of workers is a major problem for Social Security, immigrants can be part of the solution.

At Social Security, These Are the Days of the Living Dead

Trump takes away your Social Security benefits by declaring you are dead

Monty Python made real

Darius Tahir 

Rennie Glasgow, who has served 15 years at the Social Security Administration, is seeing something new on the job: dead people.

They’re not really dead, of course. In four instances over the past few weeks, he told KFF Health News, his Schenectady, New York, office has seen people come in for whom “there is no information on the record, just that they are dead.” So employees have to “resurrect” them — affirm that they’re living, so they can receive their benefits.

Revivals were “sporadic” before, and there’s been an uptick in such cases across upstate New York, said Glasgow. He is also an official with the American Federation of Government Employees, the union that represented 42,000 Social Security employees just before the start of President Donald Trump’s second term.

Martin O’Malley, who led the Social Security Administration toward the end of the Joe Biden administration, said in an interview that he had heard similar stories during a recent town hall in Racine, Wisconsin. “In that room of 200 people, two people raised their hands and said they each had a friend who was wrongly marked as deceased when they’re very much alive,” he said.

It’s more than just an inconvenience, because other institutions rely on Social Security numbers to do business, Glasgow said. Being declared dead “impacts their bank account. This impacts their insurance. This impacts their ability to work. This impacts their ability to get anything done in society.”

“They are terminating people’s financial lives,” O’Malley said.

Sheldon Whitehouse spearheads Dem effort to save Social Security and Medicare

Democrats' bill would extend Social Security and Medicare solvency 'as far as the eye can see'

Julia Conley for Common Dreams

Social Security and Medicare protect tens of millions of American senior citizens from poverty and medical bankruptcy each year, but economic justice advocates have long said the programs would be strengthened and remain fully solvent for as long as possible if the richest Americans contributed more to them—and  two Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation to ensure they do.

The bicameral bill, the Medicare and Social Security Fair Share Act, was reintroduced by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), with the aim of requiring people with yearly incomes of more than $400,000 to contribute a fairer share of their wealth to the two programs.

Currently the maximum amount of earnings for which American workers must pay Social Security taxes is just over $176,000.

The bill would lift the Social Security tax cap "to ensure that no matter the source of their income, high-income taxpayers would pay the same tax rate on their income exceeding that threshold," said the lawmakers in a press statement.

Social Security now uses Musk's "X" (a.k.a. Twitter) as its official media outlet

Blatant conflict of interest

Martin Burns & Mary Liz Burns for Common Dreams

No media outlet has done a better job on reporting on the havoc that special government employee Elon Musk and Donald Trump have unleashed than Wired. Their outstanding reporting continued as they scooped everyone by reporting that “the Social Security Administration will no longer be communicating with the media and the public through press releases and ‘dear colleague’ letters, as it shifts its public communication exclusively to X, sources tell WIRED. The news comes amid major staffing cuts at the agency.”

That’s right—all public information about Social Security will come via X. For example, in late March SSA announced that they updated their identification verification procedures via an announcement on their website. So in the future, SSA will have to put all of this into a 280-character post or SSA can go to 4,000 characters if they are willing to upgrade to Premium or Blue.

The first thing that came to mind with SSA’s announcement—wasn’t this a conflict of interest with Elon Musk’s role at X? Many other questions followed, such as the role of asking for feedback from Social Security stakeholders, members of Congress, and last but far from least in my mind—Social Security beneficiaries. I hope that congressional oversight or the press will be able to get some answers here.

According to Wired, SSA regional staff would be cut by 87%:

While Trump pretends he wants to save Social Security, Elon Musk is strangling the program with bureaucratic red tape.

Trump and Musk Are Trying to Kill Social Security

By Jim Hightower 

How ironic: The most inefficient bureaucracy in government turns out to be Donald Trump’s “Department of Government Efficiency.”

That could be humorous, except that DOGE — a creature of the right-wing Project 2025 — has been devastating to millions of people. And it’s about to get worse. Elon Musk — the flighty überrich autocrat put in charge of “efficiency” by his buddy Trump — is now going after the Social Security deposits of 73 million senior citizens.

But wait, hasn’t Trump himself promised (loudly and often) that he would not ax this essential retirement program? Yes… but Elon is his “gotcha.”

Rather than an honest kill, Musk is strangling the program with bureaucratic red tape. Claiming to be cutting waste, he’s eliminating 7,000 people who administer the program, shouting, “Bureaucratic excess!”

AARP reports that Trump may have backed down on crazy Social Security plan

Social Security Drops Most Restrictions on Benefit Claims by Phone

We'll see if it lasts

Also: why the hell is Social Security using Musk's "X" (a.k.a. Twitter) to make the announcement?

By Andy Markowitz, AARP 

The Social Security Administration (SSA) is walking back a plan to implement burdensome new in-person measures for identity verification that could have prevented millions of older Americans from applying for benefits by phone.

“Beginning on April 14, #SocialSecurity will perform an anti-fraud check on all claims filed over the telephone and flag claims that have fraud risk indicators,” the SSA announced April 8 in a series of posts on X. 

While those callers flagged for fraud risk will be required to confirm their identity in person at a Social Security field office, the agency said that claiming by phone “remains a viable option” for the vast majority of people.

An SSA spokesperson confirmed in an email statement on April 9 that the agency “will allow all claim types to be completed over the telephone.”

“This is great news for older Americans,” said Nancy LeaMond, AARP’s chief advocacy and engagement officer, in an April 9 statement. “We appreciate SSA listening to AARP and millions of Americans about the impact on their lives and providing better access to customer service for Social Security benefits.”

AARP and other advocates for older Americans and people with disabilities opposed the plan to restrict phone service for benefit applications since the SSA announced it in mid-March.

April 14 start-up: Abruptly Eliminating Social Security Phone Services Threatens Access to Benefits

Trump's Social Security Catch-22

By Kathleen Romig, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

The Trump Administration is making it harder for eligible Social Security beneficiaries to access their benefits by eliminating phone services, forcing millions more people to seek in-person help even as it cuts thousands of Social Security Administration (SSA) staff. At the same time, increasingly frequent website outages are making it harder to seek service online. These abrupt and unjustified changes will worsen customer service delays and strain capacity at local field offices throughout the country.

Trump has repeatedly promised not to cut Social Security benefits — but his Administration’s actions will effectively do just that, by making it harder or even impossible for people to access their earned benefits.

Starting April 14, phone service will no longer be an option for retirees and survivors applying for benefits, or for beneficiaries making direct deposit changes. Instead, these services will only be available in person at an SSA field office — a 45-mile trip for some 6 million seniors nationwide, a new CBPP analysis finds — or online, if an online application exists and if a person is able to access SSA’s online tools. Many seniors and people with disabilities lack internet service, computers or smartphones, or the technological savvy to navigate a multi-step, multi-factor online verification process. Even as SSA is encouraging people to do business online, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is making changes to online identity authentication that are triggering system outages and access problems.^[1]

Eliminating most applications by phone will close off an important mode of service for millions of people. Some 5.2 million people began to receive Social Security retirement, survivors, and dependent benefits in 2023.^[2] More than 4 in 10 retirees apply for their Social Security benefits by phone, as do most spouses who are eligible for benefits.^[3] So do the substantial majority of bereaved family members who are eligible for benefits following the death of a worker.

The agency estimates that ending phone service would push about 75,000 to 85,000 more people per week to seek in-person service — over 4 million annually.

SSA itself says this will lead to “longer wait times and processing time” and “increased challenges for vulnerable populations” as the demand for office appointments rises. And it comes when SSA is reportedly pursuing other^[5] policies that will increase the number of weekly field office visits by thousands. This will compound wait times and competition for an already limited number of appointments, which are required for most in-person services.

Then and now

Trumps Billionaire Commerce Secretary: Only 'Fraudsters' Will Complain If Social Security Checks Don't Arrive

Yeah, MAGA. Yeah Jim Mageau. You won't miss your Social Security checks, right?

Jessica Corbett for Common Dreams

Maybe HE won't miss his checks

As U.S. President Donald Trump's temporary leader of the Social Security Administration threatened to shut down the agency over an unfavorable court ruling on Friday, the billionaire commerce secretary came under fire for suggesting that only "fraudsters" will complain if they don't get their earned benefits.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick appeared on All-In—a podcast hosted by "four billionaire besties"—on Thursday. A brief clip of his interview, which lasted an hour and 45 minutes, made the rounds on social media Friday.

Lutnick told two of the hosts that if the SSA didn't send out checks this month, his 94-year-old mother-in-law "wouldn't call and complain," but "a fraudster always makes the loudest noise, screaming, yelling, and complaining."

Critics were quick to point out Lutnick's wealth. As More Perfect Union posted, "His net worth is estimated at $2 billion."

Richard Phillips, pensions and tax policy director for U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Ranking Member Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), called the commerce secretary's comments "shameful."

"Nearly 40% of seniors rely on Social Security for a majority of their income and nearly 1 in 7 rely on it for more than 90% of their income," according to Phillips. "These people would call due to missing checks because their very survival depends on it."

Report Exposes Musk Operatives Who Have Infiltrated Social Security Agency

What could possibly go wrong?

Jake Johnson for Common Dreams

Despite his pledge of "maximum transparency," Elon Musk has gone to great lengths to obscure the names and activities of staffers working for his Department of Government Efficiency—even claiming at one point that it is illegal to publicly identify members of the advisory commission.

That didn't stop Wired from publishing a story that names 10 DOGE operatives who have infiltrated the Social Security Administration, which is facing deep staffing cuts that advocates warn could impact the delivery of benefits.

The staffers, according to Wired, are Akash Bobba, Scott Coulter, Marko Elez, Luke Farritor, Antonio Gracias, Gautier Cole Killian, Jon Koval, Nikhil Rajpal, Payton Rehling, and Ethan Shaotran. The list "includes a number of young engineers whose presence at the SSA has not been reported."

Whitehouse calls out Trump and Musk lies about Social Security

Slandering Social Security

Social Security is YOUR money, not President Musk's. It is NOT a "Ponzi Scheme." It is cost-effective and almost fraud-free. Undocumented persons are NOT eligible for benefits.

By Philip Mattera, director of the Corporate Research Project for the Dirt Diggers Digest 

Having used spurious claims of fraud to justify an assault on scores of federal grants, Donald Trump and Elon Musk are now taking the same approach in targeting entitlements.

In his recent address to Congress, Trump recited a long list of bogus statistics about large numbers of supercentenarians supposedly receiving Social Security benefits. Musk has taken to describing that program as a Ponzi scheme.

Attacks on the legitimacy of Social Security from the Right date back decades, but for a long time they were limited to fringe groups such as the John Birch Society. 

Public support for the program was strong, even among those who had misgivings about other parts of the social safety net. Social Security was accurately seen as a benefit people had earned through a lifetime of hard work. It made no difference that the system was set up so that payments to current retirees are supported by taxes paid by those still in the labor force.

Starting in the 1990s, a new form of criticism emerged based on the argument that the system was unsustainable, given demographic changes affecting the ratio of workers to retirees. Conservatives began to claim that the program would eventually collapse, even though Congress had the power to adjust taxes and benefits to shore up the system.

Thus emerged the effort to transform Social Security from a social insurance program into something more akin to a private pension plan. In the 2000 presidential race, George W. Bush advocated partial privatization in the form of individual retirement accounts that could be invested in stocks and bonds.