Social Security Administration is There to Help, Not Hurt, Americans

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mrs. SYKES. Mr. Speaker, we started this year on a high note.

On January 5, President Biden signed the Social Security Fairness Act into law, expanding Social Security for thousands of Americans whose benefits, that they earned through years of hard work, were cut because of bad policies.

The Social Security Fairness Act is estimated to result in an average increase of $360 per month for more than 2.5 million Social Security recipients, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

These are our teachers, firefighters, and other public service employees who have dedicated their careers and their lives to serving and ultimately improving their communities. At a time when people have been struggling to make ends meet, these benefits could not have come at a better time.

This was a major victory for Ohio's 13th District and all of America, one that I was proud to support as a cosponsor, then by signing the discharge petition to bring it to the House floor before finally voting on it here on behalf of the constituents that I represent.

I have heard from countless people in my community, they are thrilled that they were finally able to get the Social Security benefit that they deserve and earned. There wasn't anywhere that I could go in the community: church, the grocery store, the gym, restaurants, someone always stopped me to thank me for voting for the Social Security Fairness Act and to tell me a story of how it is going to change lives.

You can imagine my disappointment as the Social Security Administration has taken recent actions to hurt, not help, the American people, including those in Ohio's 13th. From cutting phone helplines, to requiring certain services be conducted in person, to slowing down processing times, and closing offices, the American people are not getting the service they earned from the Social Security Administration.

Now, to add insult to injury, the Trump administration is vowing to withhold the benefits of Americans as a result of mistakes made by the Social Security Administration. Instead of making the Social Security Administration work better and remain solvent, the Trump administration is accusing seniors of fraud and calling their earned benefits waste.

The fraud is an unelected billionaire, the richest man in the world, who is cutting services to low- and middle-income families. The waste is the garbage coming out of people's mouths who don't care about seniors and say things like it is just a complicated Ponzi scheme. It is abuse by the Federal Government, abuse of people who worked hard their entire lives to support themselves and paid into a system that promised to one day support them.

Our seniors rely on Social Security to pay their bills, to put food on their tables, to keep a roof over their head, and if the Social Security Administration makes a mistake, it can be addressed in time. However, our seniors can't afford to foot the bill for when they make errors. With more than 97,000 residents of my district living under the poverty line and 175,000 residents relying on Social Security, these payments are, in fact, a lifeline.

In what world is this going to improve America? In what world is taking a lifeline away from seniors improving our economy, and in what world is constantly raising and lowering the hopes of some of our most vulnerable neighbors making America great again?

I have already heard from constituents who have been contacted by the Social Security Administration who are concerned about the changes and the cuts. They have been told that 100 percent of their benefits will be withheld until overpayments were paid back in full. These overpayments were as a result of a mistake by the Social Security Administration and not the fault of my constituents.

This means that people in my community lose their lifeline to pay for food, housing, medications, and more. This means that people in my community are suffering because of bad policy and abysmal management. Let's fix Social Security. Let's make it solvent, but let's not punish our seniors.

Changes to the Social Security Administration that prevent beneficiaries from accessing their full benefits are nothing more than backdoor benefit cuts, and I will not stand for it. I will always stand in the way of these wolf-in-sheep's-clothing policies. We already know that this is just a setup for cuts, and these changes are setups to pay for tax giveaways for the richest, the billionaires, and greedy corporations.

Mr. Speaker, I hear my colleagues say that there is a mandate, but I don't think that there is a mandate to take housing, food, and healthcare away from our seniors. I ask you and all of my colleagues who I serve with to make sure that we protect Social Security, keep it solvent, and ensure that we are protecting the benefits that they have earned for hard work over several years and decades of service.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source