Interview With Commissioner

      The AARP recently interviewed Social Security Commissioner Frank Bisignano. They’ve published a transcript. The questions were only of the softball variety. They didn’t even ask about his dual role with the IRS!

Bisignano To Testify At Congressional Hearing

      The House Ways and Means Committee has scheduled a hearing with Social Security Commissioner Frank Bisignano for 10:00 on March 4. However, this hearing concerns Bisignano’s position as “CEO” of the IRS, a position that doesn’t really exist. Nothing will prevent Committee members from asking questions about Social Security or Bisignano’s business history.

A Poll

 

Four Times? Accidental?

      From Fox 4:

… 94-year-old Helen Cvik was declared legally dead in December 2025 by Social Security. The problem is, Miss Helen is still alive.

It's the fourth time since 2017 that Miss Helen has been declared dead by the SSA, including twice in 2025 alone. The first and second incidents in 2017 and 2020 were resolved quickly, with no explanation given for the error. …

The most recent accidental declaration has not been resolved, leaving Miss Helen and her family to pick up a $5,000 bill to cover her insurance, prescriptions, and her assisted living facility care. …

Computer Systems Down

      I understand that Social Security is having nationwide computer systems problems today. Could this be related to reassigning staff who normally maintain such systems to answering the phone?

Immigration Brutality At Social Security

      From Fox 4:

59-year-old Ramona Rakestraw said she has relied on Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, as her sole source of income while battling kidney disease and cancer. She tells FOX 4 that her payments stopped in October after she was told her immigration status was under review.

Rakestraw said she was born in 1966 at Parkland Hospital in Dallas [where JFK was taken after being shot] and has never lived outside Dallas County nor has she traveled outside the United States.

Kidney disease first sent Rakestraw to dialysis at age 28. 

She later received a transplant, but about 30 years later she returned to dialysis and received a cancer diagnosis in 2024.  …

Rakestraw said she took her identification and birth certificate to her local Social Security office in an effort to resolve the issue.

"That’s my income, my whole income," she said. …

Rakestraw said she has filed an appeal and completed the required paperwork. …

     And now the problem has been solved. It only took the involvement of a TV station. 

Over 1 Billion SSNs Exposed

      From PC Mag:

In a disturbing find, a cybersecurity vendor discovered an exposed online database that may have been storing as many as 1 billion Social Security numbers (SSNs). 

A database indexed using Elasticsearch was left open on the internet, according to security provider UpGuard. The stockpile contained 3 billion records, including email addresses and passwords, along with another dataset of 2.7 billion records, including SSNs.

Specifically, the SSNs consisted of two datasets spanning 353.3GB and 76.7GB, for a total of 430GB, UpGuard told PCMag. The company suspects a hacker or “amateurish threat intelligence vendor” is behind the database.  …

Other Than This, DOGE Was Great

      From an Interim Staff Analysis by the Democratic Staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform:

Following Elon Musk’s support for Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, President Trump handed the U.S. government over to the world’s richest man through the U.S. Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. DOGE was nothing short of a catastrophe. It failed to achieve its stated goals and wreaked havoc across the federal government, weakening or terminating programs and services that the American people rely on and endangering privacy and public safety while President Trump and his billionaire friends line their own pockets. This interim staff analysis presents a preliminary account of DOGE’s costly and destructive actions during the first 13 months of President Trump’s second Administration, including: 

• Decimation and Demoralization of the Federal Workforce. DOGE coordinated with other executive branch agencies to purge the expert federal workforce and chill the nonpartisan civil servants that are left to serve the public. 

• Unlawful Attacks on Statutory Programs. The Trump Administration and DOGE have unlawfully attempted to abolish statutory programs and agencies. 

• Delay, Degradation, and Elimination of Programs and Services for Americans. From delays in getting new medications to patients, to diminished access to Social Security services and food safety inspections, to greater wildfire risks, to a global instability, the harms DOGE has imposed on the everyday lives of Americans are vast, varied, and still unfolding.

• Reckless Handling of Americans’ Data. DOGE illegally deployed systems and forcefully accessed data across federal agencies in clear violation of federal privacy and cybersecurity laws, putting Americans’ data and civil liberties at risk. 

• Dismantling of Safeguards Against Waste, Fraud, Abuse, and Corruption. The Trump Administration has weakened or eliminated key offices, fired employees, and invalidated or removed rules and regulations dedicated to protecting the public interest; and 

• Lying to the American Public. DOGE and its defenders have been caught providing false claims in court and to the American people. Additionally, DOGE claims that it terminated more than 13,440 contracts, 264 leases, and 15,887 grants across the federal government. However, DOGE’s estimated “savings” have been frequently found to be wildly inaccurate and inconsistent. The high costs of DOGE unequivocally erase any verified savings it can claim, and the full extent of its lies are still coming into focus. DOGE personnel also violated security protocols when accessing highly sensitive Social Security Administration data and potentially deceived agency leaders and federal courts to avoid disclosing those violations.

The Trump Administration has funneled an estimated $81 million to fund DOGE employees, resources, and activities with virtually no transparency or mechanisms of accountability. This staff analysis resulted in the following preliminary findings regarding the American people’s return on this egregiously mishandled investment:  

• Through DOGE alone, President Trump has cost the American people billions of dollars in damage and an intangible amount of waste and suffering. 

• President Trump used DOGE as a smokescreen to make billionaires richer at the expense of hardworking Americans. 

• America needs serious oversight and government reform that is by, of, and for the American people—not reckless and corrupt billionaires.