Man Indicted For Threatening To Blow Up Social Security Offices

Social Security office in Lubbock

     From KLBK:

A man was indicted on federal charges Wednesday and accused of threatening to blow up the Social Security Administration buildings in Lubbock [TX] and Hobbs, New Mexico, according to court documents.

Michael Wayne Nietfield, was indicted on three counts of interstate threatening communications and three counts of attempting to interfere with the Social Security Administration.

According to court documents, on July 1, Nietfield threatened that he would go to his nearest SSA building – located in Lubbock – and “blow it up.” He also said he was “going to be in jail for what he is about to do.”    

The next day he threatened to bomb the SSA building in Hobbs and ordered the manager to evacuate the office, according to court documents.

That same day, Nietfield threatened the Lubbock SSA building again.

According to court documents, he said if he didn’t get a response, “you better call them and clear them [sic] offices, cause I’m blowing these sons of b****** up.”

Students Go Hungry Because Of Social Security Backlog

   From The Spectrum, a student publication at the University of Buffalo (emphasis added):

Despite leaving her dorm 30 minutes before her lecture to get breakfast at 8:30 a.m., freshman biomedical sciences major Dina Dahhan had to settle for a partly frozen Smucker’s Uncrustables sandwich from the vending machine. 

That’s because the long lines at various eateries in the Atrium would have made her late for class. 

Dahhan isn’t the only student who has been forced to make unorthodox meal choices this past week. The national labor shortage has made it difficult for Campus Dining and Shops to meet student demand, resulting in the temporary closure of Atrium eateries, Hubies and The Bowl. The long wait times and limited hours are making it difficult for students to use their meal plans — despite the price increase on all student meal plans over the summer.   ...

CDS attributes the congestion to the national labor shortage, but also to a backlog from the Social Security Administration, which processes paperwork required for international students to work in the U.S. International students make up a large part of CDS’s workforce, so once the paperwork is pushed through, CDS hopes more food services will be available.  ...

SSA No Longer Insisting On Seeing Original Identity Documents

      From Emergency Message EM-21056: 

... While mail continues to offer an additional channel for the public to communicate with us, you must discourage customers from mailing important documents that they should keep secure and maintain in their possession, such as driver’s licenses, passports, or immigration documents. If they prefer, customers may choose to mail us secondary evidence of identity and less sensitive material. ...

Vaello-Madero Scheduled For Oral Argument On November 9

      The Supreme Court has revised its November argument calendar and added U.S. v. Vaello-Madero on November 9. Vaello-Madero presents the issue of whether it is constitutional to deny SSI benefits to U.S. citizens who reside in Puerto Rico.

     By the way, many amicus briefs have been filed already in this case. Every one supports the argument that it is unconstitutional to deny SSI to Puerto Rican residents.

    Also, by the way, the Supreme Court is going back to in person oral arguments for its October term. Will Justice Thomas go back to his silent ways?

White House Draft Of CR Contains No Additional Money For SSA

      The federal fiscal year (FY) ends on September 30 each year. Each year Congress fails to complete regular appropriations bills by that deadline so it must pass continuing resolutions (CRs) that enable government agencies to  continue to spend at the rate of the prior appropriation. The CRs generally contain special provisions allowing additional spending under the CRs for urgent needs.

    The White House has released its draft CR for this year. It contains additional funding for disasters and for Afghan refugee resettlement but no additional funding for the Social Security Administration. Of course, Congress gets a say in this. There was an earlier supplemental appropriation bill. The original Senate draft of that bill included an extra $150 million for Social Security. That was removed in negotiations. Could that return in the CR? We'll see.

SSI Disappointment

      The Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, which has jurisdiction over SSI, has announced that on September 9 and 10 his Committee will mark up a bill to be part of the budget reconciliation bill that Democrats hope to pass this month.  The announcement includes a description of what will be in the draft bill. I see no mention of SSI. This may be amended in committee but I doubt it will happen.

     The Senate Finance Committee may have different priorities. If so, the differences will have to be worked out.

Hearing Office Average Processing Time Continues To Rise

     The report shown below was obtained from Social Security by the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) and published in its newsletter, which is not available online to non-members. It contains basic operating statistics for Social Security's Office of Hearings Operations (OHO). 

     Note that the average processing time jumped from 301 days at the end of last year to 351 days as of July. I posted about this last month and received responses basically saying "What's the problem? The total number pending is down." Who outside Social Security cares what the total number pending is? What people outside the agency care about is how long it takes to get a hearing and a decision. Even though fewer appeals are being filed, it's taking longer and longer to get a hearing and a decision. That's important. There are a multitude of problems at Social Security. This is one of them. Like many of those problems, this one is going to get worse. There is a huge backlog of cases stuck at the initial and reconsideration levels. Those backlogs will eventually be worked down, leading to more appeals. Everyone expects an avalanche of disability claims once the field offices reopen.

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Happy Labor Day!