Shuffling The Deck Chairs

      From the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare:

There’s been an uncanny amount of re-shuffling of workers and resources at the Social Security Administration lately – in a feeble attempt to paper over Trump’s reckless cuts in staffing. The latest example of this game of whack-a-mole unfolded last week. 

Commissioner Frank Bisignano announced a shiny, new plan to “centralize” medical reviews for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits — which could impact nearly 9 million Americans. (Disabled workers can lose their benefits if they do not pass these periodic reviews.)

This shift yanks the review process away from experienced state Disability Determination Services (DDS) offices, supposedly to boost “accountability.” These medical reviews will now fall under the purview of SSA’s federal Disability Case Review (DCR) team. 

We suspect that this move has nothing to do with “accountability,” and really is about “re-arranging deck chairs on the Titanic,” as our senior Social Security expert, Maria Freese, puts it.  She points out that Trump’s SSA, after recklessly cutting more than 7,000 jobs when the agency already was understaffed, now finds itself falling short in key areas — and is furiously trying to plug holes.

“The agency has way too much work, with too few people. So they shift around the workload (in this case, SSDI reviews), so that overburdened staff in other areas have to do that work. That ultimately leaves SSA with a deficit somewhere else.” Freese explains. “Eventually, everyone who is reliant on the agency suffers.” …

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

 

Senators Want Answers

     From NEXTGOV/FCW: 

Twelve Democrats want answers from the Social Security Administration about its decision to shift employees that normally perform other jobs to its phone line last month with only hours of training, a move employees have said risks adding to backlogs.

SSA pushed out over 7,400 employees last year, including 1,387 contact representatives, as the Trump administration sought to reduce the size of the government’s workforce. 

Since last summer, the agency has moved over a thousand employees from its field offices to answer its phone line, and last month, Nextgov/FCW

 reported that the agency was shifting employees from its processing centers, technology office, financial unit and other offices to the phone line, too. 

Employees told Nextgov/FCW at the time that it made little sense for those processing benefit claims to answer calls, many of which may be about the status of those very claims.  …

The senators want an array of details about the reassignments, including how many employees have been moved and from what posts, the training they received, why the agency moved them, how the agency’s reassignments have impacted its functioning and any hiring SSA is doing. It recently had open jobs listed for contact center representatives. 

The letter’s signatories include Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., Angela Alsobrooks, D-Md., Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., Patty Murray, D-Wash., Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Ron Wyden, D-Ore. …

Happy Pi Day

 

John Solly Is The Alleged Culprit In Data Theft

      From Wired:

JOHN SOLLY, A software engineer and former member of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), is the DOGE operative reportedly accused in a whistleblower complaint of telling colleagues that he stored sensitive Social Security Administration (SSA) data on a thumb drive and wanted to share the information with his new employer, multiple sources tell WIRED.

Since October, according to a copy of his résumé, Solly has worked as the chief technology officer for the health IT division of a government contractor called Leidos, which has already received millions in SSA contracts and could receive up to $1.5 billion in contracts with SSA based on a five-year deal it signed in 2023. Solly’s personal website and LinkedIn have been taken offline as of this week. …

Where’s The Slack Coming From?

From: ^Commissioner Broadcast <Commissioner.Broadcast@ssa.gov>

Sent: Thursday, March 12, 2026 11:35 AM

Subject: SSA Brings Continuing Disability Review Workloads In-House  

A Message to All SSA and DDS Employees      

 

Subject: SSA Brings Continuing Disability Review Workloads In-House 

Today, we announced the agency will bring in-house the processing of medical continuing disability reviews (CDRs) from State Disability Determination Services (DDS) to our federal processing site called Disability Case Review (DCR). CDRs are conducted as part of SSA’s ongoing program integrity workload to determine whether a person receiving disability benefits should continue receiving them.   

Centralizing medical CDRs is another important step to reduce improper payments and improve customer service. This shift allows the DDSs to focus on efficiently processing disability claim decisions and benefits for eligible individuals. Reduced wait times for state level disability decisions means eligible individuals can begin receiving their critical benefits more quickly.   

DDS initial claim backlogs spiked to over 1.2 million in June of 2024. They have done great work driving down the backlog to 831,000 claimants waiting for a decision as of February 2026. This next step will maximize the DDS’s state level resources to further reduce processing time and continue to drive down the pending claims. 

 

DCR, with its experience processing initial disability claims, reconsideration cases, and medical CDRs, will now handle medical CDRs for the entire country—allowing DDS sites to focus on reducing wait times on initial claims and reconsideration cases for citizens in their state. Non-medical CDRs, which do not require the same expertise as medical CDRs to process, will continue to be handled by the agency’s field offices and processing centers. 

Frank J. Bisignano 

Commissioner 

Arbitrator Orders Telework Restored But Don’t Expect It To Happen Anytime Soon

      From Federal News Network:

A third-party arbitrator is ordering the Social Security Administration to restore telework for many of its employees, after the agency indefinitely suspended workplace flexibilities under the Trump administration.

The arbitrator, in an order signed on Wednesday, directed SSA to restore telework for employees represented by the American Federation of Government Employees. The ruling brings back telework to levels that had been in place before mid-March 2025. …

The arbitrator’s ruling won’t have an immediate impact on SSA’s workforce. An SSA spokesperson said in a statement that the agency “strongly disagrees with today’s flawed decision,” and will appeal it to the Federal Labor Relations Authority, which has a majority of Trump appointees. … 

Maybe You Shouldn’t Have Fired Them

      From the Washington Post:

… At the Social Security Administration, officials are moving forward with plans to hire at least 700 customer service representatives this year, according to two people familiar with internal discussions. The agency aims to increase its workforce by roughly 1,000 employees after losing about 7,000 last year. …