OAKLAND — A handmade signal exterior the downtown Social Safety Administration workplace mimicked a avenue signal, depicting the intersection of “Prosecute” and “Trump.” The chants got here from about 50 folks surrounding it, holding livid indicators geared toward President Donald Trump and Elon Musk: “Palms off! Palms off! Palms off!”
In downtown Harmony, a number of hundred carried indicators — “There are extra protesters right here than there are billionaires on Earth,” learn one — whereas yelling, “Hey ho, Trump should go.” At Santana Row in San Jose, an indication taped to a cardboard determine of Musk, head of the Division of Authorities Effectivity, learn: “Looter in Chief.”
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Comparable sights and chants have appeared throughout the nation in demonstrations final month and on Could 1. The protests in opposition to Trump and Musk have carried one central theme: Go away the Social Safety system alone.
“You already know,” protester Ernest Johnson, a longtime postal employee, mentioned as he walked in Oakland, “there are just a few belongings you shouldn’t actually have a thought to do. That is a type of issues. My Social Safety is my Social Safety.”
“I’ll let you know one thing else,” he mentioned after a pause. “I labored all my life for it.”
Now, Trump and Musk, of their efforts to upend federal spending, present tax cuts for the rich and fund mass deportations, have put the 90-year-old system of their sights.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Safety Act into regulation in 1935, establishing a social insurance coverage program as a federal security internet for aged, unemployed and different deprived Individuals. This system — which has been extra profitable than every other at lifting folks out of poverty, in line with the Heart for Finances and Coverage Priorities — has not been amended in any main means since 1983.
Almost all wage earners pay into the system all through their working lives on the promise of month-to-month checks at retirement. Based on the company, almost 69 million Individuals obtain advantages, that are anticipated to complete about $1.6 trillion this 12 months.
“I share their outrage,” U.S. Rep. John Garamendi, D-Solano, mentioned of the protesters. “The entire lack of empathy, the shortage of primary human care that goes into this thought course of, reveals a portrait of those that don’t have any concern in any respect for a way many individuals depend on Social Safety. Many use it as their solely supply of revenue. Folks want it for any variety of causes. You’ll be able to see that any thought to what occurs or take care of what occurs to them is simply not there.”
Garamendi has co-sponsored the Social Safety 2100 Act and launched the Truthful Price of Residing Adjustment for Seniors Act to ease rising prices going through the system. Neither has develop into a regulation; each search to deal with the long-term challenges the Social Safety system faces — with none change, the system will face a shortfall equal to 25 % of its complete advantages paid out starting in 2033.
The adjustments Trump and Musk have already tried to provoke via govt order — together with permitting DOGE unfettered entry to delicate knowledge on hundreds of thousands of Individuals — have up to now largely been challenged in courtroom via lawsuits that contend the “almost limitless entry” violates privateness legal guidelines and creates large info safety dangers. On Friday, Trump requested the Supreme Court docket to present Musk’s company entry to the delicate knowledge of hundreds of thousands of Individuals.
DOGE additionally introduced plans to successfully finish cellphone service for the 9.5 million individuals who make claims annually by cellphone, in addition to closing 47 discipline places of work. The Trump administration finally modified course on these proposals.
Musk instructed conservative discuss present host Joe Rogan that the Social Safety system was “the largest Ponzi scheme of all time,” and Fox Enterprise host Larry Kudlow mentioned that when it got here to wasteful authorities spending, the system was “the large one to get rid of.”
Garamendi countered that narrative, saying: “The DOGE boys are clearly honing in on it. They’ve tried to cut back the variety of staff. They’ve proposed an older age at which you’ll be able to gather, an older age at which you’ll be able to take early retirement. It’s all on the desk for them.”
Which will imply the social security internet may finally shut for a lot of Individuals. Garamendi mentioned the endgame for these against the essential idea of this system is to create sufficient chaos throughout the system for Individuals to lose their religion in it.
Seniors within the area already are restricted of their selections on the subject of getting assist from the company. Within the East Bay, 20 Social Safety places of work cowl an space operating from Antioch to Richmond to Berkeley to Livermore. Ten places of work serve Santa Clara County. San Mateo County has one.
To listen to some recipients inform it, the system already lacks effectivity.
Jose Ruiz, a 71-year-old resident of San Jose, mentioned he lately needed to make three visits to the downtown workplace as a result of the test he acquired had his title misspelled. Consequently, he couldn’t money it.
“The road is typically lengthy, however that’s regular,” Ruiz mentioned.
Ricardo Alexander Duram, who was aiding his mom on the similar workplace, mentioned she was an immigrant from El Salvador and had quickly protected standing, thus making her advantages troublesome and sophisticated to resume yearly.
“We at all times undergo stuff like this,” he mentioned. “It’s yearly, and it might be good if this division acquired some coaching.”
In Antioch, the place prospects stood in 80-degree warmth at some point or waited of their automobiles as a result of every of the roughly 60 seats within the workplace was occupied, 67-year-old James Harris mentioned he was happening his third hour of ready.
“It’s exhausting to see how they’ll make it any tougher than it already appears to be,” he mentioned. “It makes you ponder whether Musk or Trump have even seen the within of certainly one of these locations.”
Garamendi mentioned one of many motivations behind the Social Safety 2100 Act that he and Rep. John Larson, D-Connecticut, have been making an attempt to guide into regulation is to assist Individuals hold their religion within the Social Safety system, whilst adjustments happen. Garamendi mentioned the reforms within the act would hold sufficient cash within the system “for the following 50 years.”
“I simply hope it’s there,” 40-year-old Wendy Fischer mentioned of her personal Social Safety whereas she waited exterior the Richmond workplace final month. “I believe that’s actually the largest concern all of us have. Is it gonna be there for me? You hear what Musk and these different folks say, and it actually makes you marvel.”
Employees author Caelyn Pender contributed to this report.
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