Three Republican Senators and two Republican members of the House of Representatives have written the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to raise questions about the legality of the firing of Andrew Saul as Commissioner of Social Security and about Kilolo Kijakazi's tenure as Acting Commissioner.
I predict their effort is going nowhere. If the GOP really thought it had a case, it would be suing, not messing with GAO. The questions about Kijakazi are fairly ridiculous. They imply darkly that Kijakazi hadn't served long enough with Social Security to have been eligible to become Acting Commissioner. Leaving aside the question of whether the Vacancies Reform Act even applies in this situation since the Social Security Act itself says specifically that the President can designate anyone to be Acting Commissioner, Kijakazi started work at Social Security in January, 2021, in plenty of time to have been there 90 days, as required by the Vacancies Reform Act, before Saul was fired.
Nonsense. I agree with the Democrats that Saul had to go. Yes Saul was confirmed in the Senate by 77-16 but those voting for him didn’t know that he would start acting like a right wing dictator as soon as he took office. Saul was off the rails his first few months in office, immediately taking drastic actions that had negative impacts on thousands of employees and claimants.
ReplyDeleteAfter his arbitrary orders to end employee telework and attempts to get beneficiaries off the disability rolls: he would have been rejected by the Senate if they had known what he was all about.
I also don't think he was all that great at handling the agency during the pandemic,. For example In early 2021 he terminated overtime for key positions in the payment centers causing backlogs which employees are still struggling with.
If Senators Young, Crapo, and Scott have an issue with Saul's firing, then they should take it up with their elected representatives, Justices Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. Without those votes, the Seila Law and Collins cases would have turned out very differently, and Saul might still have his telework job.
ReplyDeleteHoisted by their own petard, as has been said often enough here.
ReplyDeletePure political theater, constituents should demand that they share the GAO response upon receipt. Cripes. 2 out of 3 of these people are lawyers. If the legal basis of the SCs rulings are not clear enough for them I pity their clients. Wait, their clients are the citizens of their states... Uh oh...
ReplyDeleteThe same would happen if the situation was reversed. Nothing Burger.
ReplyDelete