Chris Van Hollen ‘Has News’ For Elon Musk: ‘Social Security Is Not A Ponzi Scheme, It’s A Promise’

2 days ago

At a Senate Democratic press briefing on Tuesday, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) slammed DOGE’s Elon Musk over potential social security cuts.

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00:00Senator Van Hollen. Thank you. Thank you to Senator Schumer and my colleagues. I'm proud to represent

00:08the 12,000 patriotic federal employees who work at the Social Security Administration

00:16in the state of Maryland, who every day faithfully deliver promised benefits to 73 million

00:26of their fellow Americans. And we need to get some facts straight. This is an organization

00:33that runs efficiently. As the former Social Security Commissioner O'Malley has reminded us,

00:39all state operates at an 11% overhead. Liberty Mutual operates at a 23% overhead.

00:49The Social Security Administration, it operates at a one half percent overhead.

00:59Social Security Administration and those employees have never missed a payment. And

01:05they're also operating today at a 50 year low in terms of personnel. So this has nothing to do

01:14with government efficiency. This has everything to do with the most corrupt bargain in American

01:20history. Elon Musk spent $280 million to elect Donald Trump. And Donald Trump has installed

01:28Elon Musk in the cockpit of our government to rig the government for people like Elon Musk,

01:36people who are already rich and already powerful, and to do that at everybody else's expense.

01:42We're also seeing, as my colleague said, other billionaire members of the cabinet saying things

01:48like, Americans wouldn't miss their Social Security payment unless they were fraudsters.

01:54We'll say that to the 73 million Americans who do depend so many of them on that Social Security

02:02check. And Elon Musk, we have news for him. Social Security is not a Ponzi scheme. It's a promise.

02:11It's a promise the American people have made. And someone needs to remind the President of the

02:15United States about that. Because as Senator Schumer said, he came before a joint session

02:20of Congress and just lied and lied about it. So what are they up to? They are working to

02:26sabotage Social Security from the inside. They are trying to eat at its heart and its brain.

02:39First of all, they are seizing that personal data. Fortunately, we have a federal judge that's put a

02:43temporary freeze on it. But what are they doing at the Social Security Administration? Well,

02:47first they shut down the phone lines. I don't know what Elon Musk thinks. I know he's an AI

02:54whiz and a tech whiz. But there are a lot of Americans, millions of Americans, who depend

03:01on using the phone to connect with the Social Security Administration for questions.

03:06Well, they say they don't have to use the phones. They can go to the regional offices now.

03:12Well, they are closing the regional offices all over the country, 47 slated for closure

03:19by my count. Okay, so now you go to the regional offices. Well, who's going to be at the regional

03:25offices? Because they're talking about cutting 7,000 Social Security employees, 47% of the

03:32workforce. As I said, it's already at a 50-year low, the Social Security Administration workforce.

03:37So that's what they're doing. So why do you do this? You do it to undermine people's confidence

03:44and faith in Social Security so you can go right at taking down that very important promise.

03:53Because when they say Ponzi scheme, that's what they're trying to do.

03:57When we know it's a promise. And we're here to blow the whistle on it, and here to say that

04:04the nominee that they've put forward for the Social Security Administration is unfit to

04:09protect the promise of Social Security for the American people. And I thank my colleagues.

Chris Van Hollen ‘Has News’ For Elon Musk: ‘Social Security Is Not A Ponzi Scheme, It’s A Promise’

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