Here are some interesting messages from the Secretary of Homeland Security to then Acting Commissioner of Social Security Leland Dudek back in April. Note the stern, commanding tone of the messages. Note also the complete lack of legal underpinning for what is being demanded. These were posted by Social Security itself. By the way, Dudek, who apparently has a Twitter account, liked and retweeted my tweet about this. As always, click on the images below to view full size.
A letter from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) (footnotes omitted):
July 7, 2025
Mr. Aram Moghaddassi
Chief Information Officer
Mr. Michael Russo
Chief Information Officer
Social Security Administration
6401 Security Boulevard
Baltimore, MD 21235
Chief Information Officer Open Recommendations: Social Security Administration
I am writing to you both with respect to your roles as the Chief Information Officers (CIO) of the Social Security Administration (SSA). As an independent, non-partisan agency that works for Congress, GAO’s mission is to support Congress in meeting its constitutional responsibilities and help improve the performance and ensure the accountability of the federal government. Our work includes investigating matters related to the use of public funds, evaluating programs and activities of the U.S. Government at the request of congressional committees and subcommittees or on the initiative of the Comptroller General, and as required by public laws or committee reports. Our duties include reporting our findings and recommending ways to increase economy and efficiency in government spending. The purpose of this letter is to provide an overview of the open, publicly available GAO recommendations to SSA that call for the attention of the CIOs.
We identified recommendations that relate to the CIOs’ roles and responsibilities in effectively managing IT. They include strategic planning, investment management, and information security. We have previously reported on the significance of the CIO’s role in improving the government’s performance in IT and related information management functions. Your attention to these recommendations will help ensure the secure and effective use of IT at the agency.
Currently, SSA has 11 open recommendations that call for the attention of the CIOs. Each of these recommendations relates to a GAO High-Risk area: (1) Ensuring the Cybersecurity of the Nation or (2) Improving IT Acquisitions and Management. In addition, GAO has designated one of the 11 as a priority recommendation. Fully implementing these open recommendations agencies. They are highlighted because, upon implementation, they may significantly improve government operations, for example, by realizing large dollar savings; eliminating mismanagement, fraud, and abuse; or making progress toward addressing a high-risk or duplication issue. Since 2015, GAO has sent letters to selected agencies to highlight the importance of implementing such recommendations. Fully implementing these open recommendations could significantly improve SSA’s ability to deter threats and manage its critical systems, operations, and information. I have summarized selected recommendations here. See the enclosure for a full list, and additional details on the recommendations.
Ensuring the Cybersecurity of the Nation. SSA needs to take additional steps to secure the information systems it uses to carry out its mission. Specifically, we recommended that the agency fully implement all event logging requirements as directed by the Office of Management and Budget. Until SSA does so, there is increased risk that the agency will not have complete information from logs on its systems to detect, investigate, and remediate cyber threats.
Improving IT Acquisitions and Management. SSA needs to take steps to improve its IT operations, including developing a complete inventory of telecommunications assets and more consistently tracking software licenses. For example, we recommended that the CIO verify the completeness of SSA’s inventory of current telecommunications assets, and establish a process for ongoing maintenance of the inventory. Until SSA does so, the agency is more likely to experience delays and increased costs during telecommunications contract transitions. We also recommended that SSA consistently track software licenses that are currently in use and compare its inventories of software licenses in use to purchased licenses. Implementing this recommendation will allow SSA to take advantage of opportunities to reduce costs and better inform its investment decision-making.
Copies of this letter are being sent to the appropriate congressional committees and the Federal CIO. The letter will also be available at no charge on the GAO website at https://www.gao.gov. In addition, we sent a separate letter, related to agency-wide priority recommendations, to theCommissioner of SSA.
If you have any questions or would like to discuss any of the recommendations outlined in this letter, please do not hesitate to contact me at marinosn@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this letter. Our teams will continue to coordinate with your staff on addressing these 11 open recommendations that call for the attention of the CIOs. I appreciate SSA’s continued commitment and thank you for your personal attention to these important recommendations.
Nick Marinos
Managing Director
Information Technology and Cybersecurity
A Twitter post by the Social Security Administration yesterday:
Today, Commissioner Bisignano spoke at the National Academy of Social Insurance (NASI) event to commemorate the 90th anniversary of Social Security alongside James Roosevelt III, grandson of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Rep. Danny Davis, and Rebecca Vallas, CEO of NASI.
Democratic Senators Wyden and Warren have written the Commissioner of Social Security asking for answers about the sudden reassignments of front line agency employees to answering 1-800 phone calls at about the same time that many metrics of agency functioning have been removed from public view.
From a report by the widely respected Penn Wharton Budget Model:
From Government Executive:
In recent days, the Social Security Administration and its newly confirmed commissioner Frank Bisignano have celebrated “key milestones” in its quest to improve customer service, citing its implementation of the Social Security Fairness Act and addition of new automated service lanes on the agency’s 1-800 number and website. …
But workers at the agency say that as the agency shrinks by an aspired 7,000 workers this fiscal year, management is simultaneously scrambling to triage escalating workloads, causing a communications whiplash akin to being “gaslit,” one said. …
Beginning last week, the agency involuntarily reassigned 500 field office customer support representatives to handle calls to the 1-800 number indefinitely and without notice. By Tuesday, that number had risen to 1,000 reassignments. …
They’re robbing Peter to pay Paul,” [said the leader of the union that represents most Social Security employees].“And it really invalidates [Bisignano’s] whole theory and vision that SSA doesn’t need any more staff and that AI—or other technology—will solve the customer service problems at the agency and on the 1-800 number.” …
Bisignano’s email to staff on Monday included an additional bit of news: performance bonuses will be distributed next month. Though Bisignano said he “directed” their distribution, the bonuses were originally slated to go out earlier this year but were delayed during the tenure of then-acting Commissioner Leland Dudek. …
From an op ed piece in the Washington Post by Senators Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Tim Kaine (D-VV):
… We propose creating an additional investment fund — in parallel to the trust fund, not replacing it — that would be invested in stocks, bonds and other investments that generate a higher rate of return, helping keep the program from running dry.
We estimate that it would take a $1.5 trillion up-front investment into the fund to get it going, and we propose giving the fund 75 years to grow. The Treasury would temporarily shoulder the burden of providing benefits to Social Security beneficiaries — but when the new fund’s 75 years are up, it would pay the Treasury back and supplement payroll taxes to help fill the future gap.
The result? The consistent delivery of Social Security benefits for generations of Americans, and a reduction to the United States’ long-term indebtedness by up to 20 percent. …
From a press release:
Social Security Administration (SSA) today announced significant progress in its ongoing efforts to improve customer service while handling record transaction volumes. Key milestones include:
- Completing over 3.1 million payments to all who were entitled under the Social Security Fairness Act (SSFA) five months ahead of schedule
- Continuing to upgrade SSA’s telephone technology nationwide, deploying the platform to 841 field offices, representing 70 percent of field offices nationwide
- Reducing the average speed of answer (ASA) on the 800 Number to 13 minutes, a 35 percent reduction compared to this time last year and over a 50 percent reduction compared to last year’s annual average
- Optimizing technology on the 800 Number so that 90 percent of calls handled are now served via automated self-service options or convenient callbacks, minimizing hold times
- Implementing a new service model in field offices that has reduced wait times about 10 percent for all customers year-over-year
- Decreasing the initial disability claims backlog by 25 percent, from a record high of 1.2 million cases pending last summer to 950,000 cases pending today
- Achieving a historic low of approximately 276,000 disability hearings pending, with customers experiencing wait times 60 days shorter than last summer
- Upgrading the my Social Security online portal to provide uninterrupted, 24/7 access to customers starting mid-July …
From the Philadelphia Inquirer:
For a “real lesson in torture,” try calling your local Social Security Administration office with a question.
That’s what Marcia Chestnut, a 62-year-old former housekeeper from Philadelphia, sardonically suggests.
In February, Chestnut — who lives with various disabilities — received a notice from the SSA saying her benefits would be cut off by April.
To find out why, Chestnut phoned her local SSA office every weekday for two months. She’d get put on hold for four hours or longer, then the calls would be disconnected.
“Live people don’t answer,” she said. “You’re not getting anybody who’ll talk to you.” …
We spend a lot of time calling Social Security offices on people’s behalf — sometimes 15 times a day,“ [a local advocate] said. ”We’re on hold for hours, then get AI bots spewing random information you never asked for before hanging up. …
From a press release:
House Committee on Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith (MO-08), Social Security Subcommittee Chairman Ron Estes (KS-04), and Work & Welfare Subcommittee Chairman Darin LaHood (IL-16) announced today that the Subcommittees on Social Security and Work & Welfare will hold a joint hearing to discuss barriers to work and how policymakers can support opportunities for individuals with disabilities to establish, renew, or strengthen their connection to the workforce. The hearing will take place on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, at 2:00 PM …
When they say “support”, they may mean “demand.” Time limited benefits would be a possibility. That may be the next logical step for Republicans. Further work incentives are pointless. If you demand that they be half dead to get benefits, why are you surprised that they don’t go back to work?
Update: This hearing has already been postponed. No new date given.
A Las Vegas television station did its own checking on call wait times at Social Security and concludes that the 18.5 minute call wait time that the Social Security Administration is giving out is "wildly optimistic."
I think this needs a Office of Inspector General investigation.
The Washington Post has an article on the emails from Social Security to beneficiaries touting the passage of the “Big, Beautiful Bill.” Only at the end does it mention how wildly inappropriate the emails are. Apparently, they regard this as something only of interest to “left-leaning” groups. It’s much the same with USA Today, CNN and NBC News. Apparently, the New York Times has taken off for the long weekend and hasn’t noticed the emails at all. By Sunday or Monday it may just be old news to them.
I have trouble believing it but apparently Social Security sent out this e-mail yesterday to many Social Security benefits recipients. It didn’t go out to all of them. I’m on retirement benefits and I did not receive it.
This is wrong. It’s probably illegal. It’s misleading. The “Big Beautiful Bill” contains no provisions touching on the work done by the Social Security Administration.
From Emergency Message EM-25040 released yesterday:
… Effective immediately, the agency will comply with the relevant legal authorities in initial claims by removing references to an option to receive a paper check and directing people who insist on a paper check to apply to Treasury for a waiver.In compliance with the law and enforced by the recently released EO, the following changes supersede current instructions in GN 02402.001and GN 02402.005 and are effective as of the date of this publication.1. Updates to GN 02402.001
a. Section C bullet 4 is no longer applicable and has been removed. Effective immediately, technicians should no longer offer a temporary paper check option while waiting for Treasury contact regarding enrollment in electronic funds transfer (EFT) .b. Section C bullet 5 should read:“As of March 1, 2013, Title II beneficiaries and Title XVI recipients must select a form of electronic payment or if they allege a qualifying exemption, then apply for a waiver. Treasury is responsible for reviewing the request and making a determination. Instruct the individual to contact the U.S. Treasury Electronic Payment Solution Center at 1-800-967-5042. Currently, SSA cannot accept a waiver application or approve a waiver request. Treasury will contact the individuals directly once they make a determination.”
c. Additionally, field offices are no longer required to maintain a list of financial institutions in their servicing area. …
This will be much harder to implement than it sounds.
From USA Today:
… Over the last several weeks, the agency has stopped making public 34 real-time performance metrics about things like how long they will have to wait to reach a live person on the phone, and how long applications for new senior benefits or social security benefits take to be approved. The metrics have been used for years to show how time-consuming it can be to reach a live person at certain locations or through the national 1-800 number, and as an accountability measure for the agency.
Instead the webpage now emphasizes how quickly problems can be resolved online, and says the "average speed of answer," which excludes callback wait time, is 19.2 minutes.
USA TODAY reporters called Social Security's 1-800 line multiple times over several days and found the wait times to be consistently over an hour. Multiple times they did not reach a live person before the line disconnected with no warning. …
Concerned that the information now available on the website didn't match what her staff was hearing from constituents, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren's staff began conducting its own test of the 1-800 number, making hourly phone calls from June 12 through June 20.
In a letter Warren sent to Bisignano late on June 25, she called the results of her office survey "deeply troubling." Compared to the number available online, wait times averaged nearly an hour and 45 minutes and often exceeded three hours.
Data from the office survey showed that in 50 calls, more than 50% were never answered by a human. The majority ended when the caller was placed on hold and then the call dropped.
Of calls that were answered, 32% had wait times exceeding two hours. The average wait time was 102 minutes. …
Jen Burdick, supervising attorney at Community Legal Services of Philadelphia, said they haven't seen a reduction in call times.
"Social Security attorneys and paralegals from our office call SSA dozens of times every day. We are uniformly finding that we can't get placed into the queue, either because of system outages, phone disconnects, or AI chatbot issues. When we do get put into the queue, wait times seem to be up from last year ‒ sometimes more than an hour. …
I’m fully expecting no further Congressional hearings on Social Security in this Congress but Commissioner Bisignano could still be subpoenaed to testify about this issue before a Social Security Subcommittee controlled by Democrats in 2027 even if he’s no longer Commissioner.
From the New York Times:
The Trump administration has backed away from a maneuver in which it sought to classify thousands of living immigrants as dead in a critical Social Security database, part of a strategy to pressure them to self-deport.
In April, the Social Security Administration placed roughly 6,300 migrants whose legal status had been revoked on its “death master file,” a vital data set that gets distributed to banks, lenders and other financial institutions. …
[N]ow the Social Security Administration has reversed course, taking them off the list in a process known internally as being “resurrected,” according to S.S.A. and White House officials.
Instead, the Social Security numbers of the 6,300 migrants are being flagged as “unverified” in a system typically used by financial institutions to check the numbers. The website generates that response when a person’s Social Security number, name or date of birth do not match the agency’s records. That classification is typically used when a Social Security number may be fraudulent, erroneous or mistakenly associated with someone. …
The new approach was spearheaded by Frank Bisignano, the new commissioner of the agency who took over in May, according to an administration official. It comes after the initial decision to put migrants on the death list generated enormous controversy within the agency. At one meeting shortly after the decision was made, senior level S.S.A. officials had voiced widespread “policy, legal and data integrity” concerns about the approach, according to an email summarizing the meeting viewed by The New York Times. …
Whitney Wimbish has written a piece for The American Prospect predicting that the Social Security Administration will end enumeration at birth, the current process that almost automatically assigns a Social Security number to every child born in the U.S. Instead, parents would have to go through some application process. The point would be to prevent assigning Social Security numbers to the children of non-citizens.
This could happen but there are obvious obstacles. Social Security isn’t remotely ready for the workload. Parents would be frustrated by the process. It’s all unconstitutional anyway. The 14th Amendment clearly says that virtually all children born in the U.S. are U.S. citizens.
The Supreme Court has said the courts can’t issue nationwide injunctions. Great. There are thousands of Social Security attorneys around the country ready to adjudicate this in every district in the country for the Equal Access to Justice Act fees. Easy money. By the time this issue is finally before the Supreme Court, the Trump Administration will wish it had been dealing with a nationwide injunction.
