Elon Musk leaves behind fewer Social Security Administration staff to deal with more in-person clients, a backlog of cases, and other annoyances at an organization that offers retirement and disability benefits to almost 74 million people as he departs from the Trump administration and its so-called Department of Government Efficiency.
Musk, a significant Republican campaign supporter, said Wednesday night that he was leaving his position with the government. He has stated that he will return to his previous positions, which include being the owner of the social media platform X and the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla (TSLA).
Musk stated that his goal as a so-called special government employee was to reduce government waste, fraud, and abuse. DOGE’s measures included a 12% reduction in the Social Security Administration’s employment, the closure of some regional offices, and adjustments to procedures that require more recipients to physically visit offices.
“There are 7,000 fewer workers to do the job. The workload is more taxing overall. Two million more people must visit physical offices to complete chores, according to Kathleen Romig, head of disability and Social Security policy at the independent research organization Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.
“People’s anxiety has led to a huge increase in demand. They want to be reassured. Copies of their records are what they are attempting to obtain. They’re frightened about Social Security disappearing, so they’re applying for retirement even earlier,” Romig added.
The SSA said in April that it will start performing an anti-fraud check on all phone claims and highlighting those that were thought to be at risk of fraud. According to the agency, any beneficiaries whose claims are flagged will need to present identification in person in order for their claim to be processed.
Out of almost 110,000 new instances, the SSA has discovered two cases of possible fraud, according to NextGov, a federal government news website. However, according to a Social Security official, beneficiaries have been shielded from an estimated $19.9 million in damages thanks to the improved fraud checks for phone changes made to direct-deposit information.
People will need to make more than 1.93 million more trips to Social Security field offices annually as a result of the phone service restrictions and other policy changes, including the end of the Enumeration Beyond Entry program, which had permitted the automatic issuance of Social Security numbers and cards to new U.S. citizens and noncitizens with work authorization, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
According to the CBPP, half of all seniors nationwide have to travel at least 33 minutes to see a field office. According to the CBPP, approximately 8 million seniors report having a physical condition or impairment that makes it difficult for them to travel outside of their homes, and over 6 million seniors do not drive, making it more difficult for them to get to an office.
“Elon Musk is officially leaving government, but his toxic footprint remains at agencies across the government, including Social Security,” stated Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, an advocacy group.
According to the Trump administration, DOGE has become a better organization.
“From updating its technological infrastructure to stepping up efforts to detect waste, fraud, and abuse, DOGE has been instrumental in upgrading the Social Security Administration. White House spokesman Liz Huston stated, “This crucial work will continue to ensure the federal government is appropriately serving the American taxpayers.”
Musk replaces individuals like Frank Bisignano, the newly appointed SSA commissioner, who has referred to himself as a “DOGE person.”
“Up until now, that goal has involved displacing thousands of seasoned public officials with an ineffective [artificial intelligence] chatbot. This resulted in a 25% slowdown in claims processing and the waste of resources on a witch hunt for essentially nonexistent fraud. Altman explained that it meant incorrectly proclaiming individuals dead and putting them through a bureaucratic ordeal.
Receiving a busy signal at SSA’s toll-free phone number is another indicator that impacts customer service; according to SSA statistics examined by the CBPP, this occurred in 15% of cases on average in April after being nearly nonexistent the previous year.
According to Romig, the agency has upgraded its AI bot on the phone system in the past month.
“Instead of answering the query, the bot frequently provides nonsequiturs and information on the Social Security Administration. More than 50% of callers never speak to a representative. The stats don’t reflect the frustration and hanging up that people are experiencing,” she said.
According to SSA data, the percentage of retirement, survivor, and Medicare benefit claims that were processed on time has drastically decreased since January, undoing the progress gained under Social Security Commissioner Martin O’Malley’s administration, which ran from 2023 to 2024. According to Romig, there are currently over 600,000 pending applications for Medicare, retirement, and survivor benefits.
Additionally, according to SSA data, the number of pending cases in SSA’s processing centers has increased by more than 1 million since the end of fiscal 2024. Back pay and benefit type conversions, such as switching from a retiree benefit to a survivor benefit following the death of a spouse, are examples of “post-entitlement” modifications that are handled by the processing centers.
According to some, DOGE has taken positive steps.
Rachel Greszler, a senior research fellow for the workforce and public finance at the Heritage Foundation, stated, “We know that getting Social Security employees back into local Social Security offices where they can meet in person with individuals will improve customer service, but it’s too early to know the impact that DOGE’s efforts have had – and will have – on overall customer service and satisfaction.”
“For the next five years, 98.5% of the SSA’s unionized employees will have the ability to work remotely thanks to an agreement that previous SSA Commissioner Martin O’Malley made with the agency’s union after President [Donald] Trump was elected but before he took office. “With only 863 SSA employees required to report to work on any given day, it’s quite difficult to meet the needs of 73 million Social Security beneficiaries across more than 1,400 Social Security offices,” she said.
Greszler added that DOGE was able to delete the records of those who passed away many years ago.
“At a minimum, this will reduce the frequency and amount of improper payments in Social Security and likely other government programs,” Greszler stated.
For years, the SSA has had problems. Even though the number of recipients increased by 25% between 2010 and 2024, the agency’s budget decreased by 19% and staffing decreased by 11%, according to Mark Miller, an authority on the agency and the author of the 2023 book “Retirement Reboot: Commonsense Financial Strategies for Getting Back on Track.”
“All that leads up to DOGE coming in with a wrecking ball,” Miller stated. “Now things are reaching catastrophic levels.”
“Are we going to break something?” even Leland Dudek, the acting Social Security commissioner from February to May, questioned earlier this year. I’m not sure.” His predecessor, O’Malley, warned in March that the agency would “collapse” within the next 30 to 90 days and fall behind on payments for the first time ever. Although the organization hasn’t failed as some had anticipated, Social Security’s reputation has suffered due to its numerous issues, no matter how little.
“When backlogs build up, people don’t get the money they are owed as quickly as they should or errors accumulate over time,” Romig explained. Death by a thousand cuts is what it is. It’s not necessary a significant and dramatic agency break. There are numerous accounts of people giving up, waiting longer, or failing to achieve their goals. This implies that they aren’t receiving their rightful advantage for as long as they ought to.
