howard-lutnick

Lazy Caturday Reads: The Attack on Social Security and Other Outrages

Good Afternoon!!

Yesterday the realization that Elon Musk and his DOGE bandits are dead set on stealing our Social Security hit home for millions of Americans. Perhaps some of the MAGA cultists are still lying to themselves, but plenty of Trump voters now know they made a huge mistake.

Two days ago, Maryland District Judge Ellen Hollander ordered the acting head of the Social Security Administration Leland Dudek to stop DOGE bandits from accessing recipients’ personal information. Dudek responded by threatening to shut down the agency entirely.

Reuters: Judge stops Musk’s team from ‘unbridled access’ to Social Security private data.

March 20 (Reuters) – A federal judge said on Thursday the Social Security Administration likely violated privacy laws by giving tech billionaire Elon Musk‘s aides “unbridled access” to the data of millions of Americans, and ordered a halt to further record sharing.

U.S. District Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander of Maryland said Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency was intruding into “the personal affairs of millions of Americans” as part of its hunt for fraud and waste under President Donald Trump.

“Really, I want to turn it off and let the courts figure out how they want to run a federal agency,” he said….

Earlier on Thursday, Judge Hollander, in her ruling, said: “To be sure, rooting out possible fraud, waste, and mismanagement in the SSA is in the public interest. But, that does not mean that the government can flout the law to do so.”

The case has shed light for the first time on the amount of personal information DOGE staffers have been given access to in the databases, which hold vast amounts of sensitive data on most Americans.

The SSA administers benefits for tens of millions of older Americans and people with disabilities, and is just one of at least 20 agencies DOGE has accessed since January.

Hollander said at the heart of the case was a decision by new leadership at the SSA to give 10 DOGE staffers unfettered access to the records of millions of Americans. She said lawyers for SSA had acknowledged that agency leaders had given DOGE access to a “massive amount” of records.

“The DOGE Team is essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion. It has launched a search for the proverbial needle in the haystack, without any concrete knowledge that the needle is actually in the haystack,” Hollander said….

One of the systems DOGE accessed is called Numident, or Numerical Identification, known inside the agency as the “crown jewels,” three former and current SSA staffers told Reuters. Numident contains personal information of everyone who has applied for or been given a social security number.

After a new order from Judge Hollander, Dudek has backed down on his threat to shut down the Social Security Administration.

The Washington Post: Federal judge pushes back on acting Social Security head over threat to close agency.

Acting Social Security commissioner Leland Dudek threatened Thursday evening to bar Social Security Administration employees from accessing its computer systems in response to a judge’s order blocking the U.S. DOGE Service from accessing sensitive taxpayer data.

Less than 24 hours later — after the judge rejected his argument and the White House intervened — Dudek is saying he was “out of line.”

Lucy Almey Bird, A good book

Dudek initially told news outlets, including in a Friday interview with The Washington Post, that the judge’s decision to bar sensitive data access to “DOGE affiliates” was overly broad and that to comply, he might have to block virtually all SSA employees from accessing the agency’s computer systems. But Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, who issued the order, said in a letter that Dudek’s assertions “were inaccurate.”

“Employees of SSA who are not involved with the DOGE Team or in the work of the DOGE Team are not subject to the Order,” Hollander wrote in the letter on Friday sent to lawyers involved in the case. “ … Moreover, any suggestion that the Order may require the delay or suspension of benefit payments is incorrect.”

In response to Hollander’s letter, Dudek said in a statement that the court clarified its guidance and “therefore, I am not shutting down the agency.”

Dudek, in a follow-up interview Friday afternoon with The Post, thanked Hollander for the clarification, adding, “The president is committed to keeping the Social Security offices open to serve the public.” He then acknowledged that this was an about-face from his stance in an interview with The Post earlier in the day.

“[The White House] called me and let me know it’s important to reaffirm to the public that we’re open for business,” he said. “The White House did remind me that I was out of line and so did the judge. And I appreciate that.”

Yeah, right. I’m sure King Trump is very concerned about us peons who need Social Security to live.

Hollander issued a two-week temporary restraining order Thursday that prohibits Social Security officials from sharing personally identifiable information with Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service, which has been empowered to carry out cost-cutting across the government.

Hollander, who was appointed by President Barack Obama, wrote that DOGE “essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion” and “never identified or articulated even a single reason for which the DOGE Team needs unlimited access to SSA’s entire record systems.”

To top all that, yesterday a video surfaced of Trump’s Commerce Secretary, billionaire Howard Lutnick, claiming that seniors who missed a social security check wouldn’t miss it and anyone who complained was a “fraudster” “stealing” from the government. I don’t think Lutnick understands that Social Security is funded by the payments made by recipients all of their working lives.

Rachel Maddow spent much of her show last night talking about Lutnick’s clueless statement.

Liam Archacki at The Daily Beast: Billionaire Trump Aide Uses Mom-in-Law, 94, to Defend DOGE Social Security Cuts.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said his 94-year-old mother-in-law wouldn’t be worried if she didn’t receive her Social Security check one month.

Lutnick argued that the only people upset about DOGE head Elon Musk targeting Social Security are fraudsters abusing the system.

“Let’s say Social Security didn’t send out their checks this month. My mother-in-law, who’s 94, wouldn’t call and complain,” he said during a Thursday appearance on the All-In podcast. “She just wouldn’t. She’d think something got messed up and she’ll get it next month.”

Public records suggest that his mother-in-law, Geri Lambert, lives with Lutnick and his wife Allison, at his Upper East Side townhouse in Manhattan. If that is the case, she is unlikely to be relying on Social Security for rent or mortgage payments.

Lutnick, who was nominated to the role by President Donald Trump, amassed a fortune worth around $1.5 billion over more than 30 years as the CEO of the investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald. He stepped down from the position in February when he was confirmed as commerce secretary.

“A fraudster always makes the loudest noise screaming, yelling, and complaining,” the commerce secretary continued. “Elon knows this by heart… The easiest way to find the fraudster is to stop payments and listen, because whoever screams is the one stealing.”

It isn’t the first eyebrow-raising statement Lutnick has made in support of Musk—even this week.

On Wednesday, Lutnick appeared on Fox News and urged viewers to “buy Tesla” stock, which has been plummeting amid protests against Musk’s efforts to reshape the federal government. Musk is the CEO of the electric vehicle manufacturer.

He called Musk “probably the best person to bet on I’ve ever met,” saying: “It’s unbelievable that this guy’s stock is this cheap.”

This guy is completely out of touch with reality.

More on Trump/Musk’s plans for Social Security from Ashley Lopez at NPR: The Social Security Administration’s many proposed changes are worrying advocates.

In the past month, the Trump administration has announced a flurry of changes at the agency that administers Social Security.

Among these changes are plans to cut thousands of jobs, close offices and enact new policy — including more stringent identity checks that could require in-person office visits.

By Natsuo Ikegami

Advocates warn these sweeping moves could lead to seniors and people with disabilities having a harder time getting help with their crucial benefits.

Already, getting assistance can be burdensome.

“My first phone call that I made to Social Security, I was on hold for 3 hours and 15 minutes before I spoke to somebody,” Aaron Woods, who’s been trying for months to help his mother sort out her Social Security and Medicare benefits, told NPR.

Read more about Woods’ case at the link. These problems existed before DOGE got involved.

For years, advocates say the Social Security Administration has struggled to keep up with its growing workload. Besides retirement services, the agency runs programs that provide survivor benefits and disability benefits and supplemental income for the very poor.

“There simply have not been enough workers to administer the benefits timely,” said Kristen Dama, a managing attorney at Community Legal Services of Philadelphia, which helps people navigate the benefits process. “To make sure that mistakes aren’t made. And then when people get disconnected, whether it’s for financial reasons or for mistakes, there’s just not enough people … to allow recipients to get reconnected easily.”

And problem-solving could get harder as the agency plans to cut 7,000 jobs — though its current staffing of about 57,000 is already at a 50-year low….

The agency also announced it would undergo a massive restructuring by eliminating six out of its 10 regional offices, which Dama said would significantly affect her organization’s ability to sort out problems for her clients.

“For legal aid advocates, both at my organization and across the country, the regional offices are really the fixers, are the quality control, and they play that role also for constituent service staff, social services organizations,” she said. “They are really the place where problems that can’t be solved get escalated.”

There’s much more information at the link. This is a great article.

Leah Willingham at AP: New Social Security requirements pose barriers to rural communities without internet, transportation.

Veronica Taylor doesn’t know how to turn on a computer, let alone use the internet.

The 73-year-old can’t drive and is mostly housebound in her mountainous and remote West Virginia community, where a simple trip to the grocery store can take an hour by car.

New requirements that Social Security recipients access key benefits online or in person at a field office, rather than on the phone, would be nearly impossible to meet without help.

“If that’s the only way I had to do it, how would I do it?” Taylor said, talking about the changes while eating a plate of green beans, mac and cheese and fried fish with a group of retirees at the McDowell County Senior Center. “I would never get nothing done.”

The requirements, set to go into effect March 31, are intended to streamline processes and combat widespread fraud within the system, according to President Donald Trump and officials in his administration.

Time to Oneself, Marcella Cooper

Bullshit.

They say that’s why it’s vital for people to verify their identity online or in person when signing up for benefits, or making a change like where the money is deposited.

But advocates say the changes will disproportionately impact the most vulnerable Americans. It will be harder to visit field offices in rural areas with high poverty rates. Often these are the same areas that lack widespread internet service.

Many Social Security field offices are also being shut down, part of the federal government’s cost-cutting efforts. That could mean seniors have to travel even farther to visit, including in parts of rural West Virginia.

At least now the efforts to kill Social Security are out in the open. I guarantee you if there is a missed payment the public reaction will shock self-satisfied billionaires like Howard Lutnick, Elon Musk, and Donald Trump.

Meanwhile, Musk is throwing a tantrum about judges who are simply interpreting U.S. laws.

Nick Robbins-Early at The Guardian: Elon Musk lashes out at US judges as they rule against Doge.

In the days after a federal judge ruled Elon Musk’s dismantling of USAID likely violated the constitution, the world’s richest person issued a series of online attacks against the American judiciary, offered money to voters to sign a petition opposing “activist judges”, and called on Congress to remove his newfound legal opponents from office.

“This is a judicial coup,” Musk wrote on Wednesday, asking lawmakers to “impeach the judges”.

Musk, who serves as a senior adviser to Donald Trump, posted about judges who ruled in opposition to the administration more than 20 times within 48 hours this week on X, the social network he owns, repeatedly framing them as radical leftist activists and seeking to undermine their authority. His denunciations came as his so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) faces sweeping and numerous legal challenges to its gutting overhaul of the government, which has involved firing thousands of workers and gaining access to sensitive government data.

Doge is the subject of nearly two dozen lawsuits, which in some cases have already resulted in judges imposing more transparency on Musk’s initiative or reversing parts of its rapid-fire cuts at federal agencies. The legal pushback poses one of the most significant challenges to Musk’s plans, which for weeks after inauguration day involved operating with expansive powers and little evident oversight.

While Musk posts online, he is also directing some of his immense wealth towards those who support his cause. Musk donated funds to seven Republican members of Congress who called for impeaching judges, the New York Times reported, giving the maximum allowable donation of $6,600 to their campaigns.

Musk also launched a petition on Thursday against “activist judges” via his political action group America Pac, which offered registered voters in Wisconsin $100 if they signed. Musk’s Pac has funneled millions of dollars into the state’s 1 April supreme court race, in which he is backing a former Republican attorney general in another attempt to reshape the country’s courts.

How is that legal? But he got away with it in Pennsylvania during the 2024 election when he offered 1 million prizes for people who signed a petition.

By Laura El

Musk is also furious about “leakers” who have talked to the press about his DOGE meddling.

Politico: Leakers to Musk: We’re ‘not Elon’s servants.’

The pervasive fear and anger that have been rippling through federal agencies over Elon Musk’s slashing approach to shrinking government deepened even further on Friday over the billionaire tech mogul’s threat to root out and punish anyone who is leaking to the media.

They’ve already taken every precaution they can for fear of retaliation: setting Signal messages to automatically disappear, taking photos of documents they share instead of screenshotting, using non-government devices to communicate. But disclosing the chaos caused by Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, for many, outweighs the risks that come with leaking.

Following Thursday’s New York Times report that Musk was set to receive a Pentagon briefing about a confidential contingency plan for a war with China, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO posted on his social media platform X that leakers “will be found” and, he intimated, punished.

“I look forward to the prosecutions of those at the Pentagon who are leaking maliciously false information to NYT,” Musk wrote in his post.

Oooooh! How scary!

But Musk’s post is not having the chilling effect on leakers he’d intended, according to conversations with more than half a dozen government employees who had previously spoken to POLITICO. If anything, it might be the other way around.

“We are public servants, not Elon’s servants,” said one Food and Drug Administration employee who, like all people interviewed for this story, was granted anonymity to speak candidly about internal dynamics. “The public deserves to know how dysfunctional, destructive, and deceptive all of this has been and continues to be.”

“Leakers are patriots,” said one Agriculture Department employee. Helping the media report on problems or concerns inside agencies, the USDA employee added, is motivated by a desire for greater transparency — the same goal Musk has said undergirds his own work through DOGE….

Musk’s comments may not have caused a major shift in how federal workers view sharing information with reporters, one federal employee at a health agency said, citing group chats with other employees.

But even before Musk’s comments this week, the prevailing atmosphere inside many federal agencies — from constant threats of firing and being labeled enemies of the public to ousting them for following orders from previous administrations — have left employees feeling vulnerable, increasingly incensed and concerned about their physical safety.

There’s quite a bit more at the Politico link.

By Rakhmeet Redzhepov

Musk is also paying a price in attitudes toward his EV company Tesla. He and his rich buddies think attacks on Tesla locations and individual cars is a conspiracy, but it is really organic. Let me say up front that I don’t condone violence or vandalism.

NBC News: No evidence of coordinated vandalism of Teslas despite Musk and Trump claims.

Law enforcement officials and domestic extremism experts say they have found no evidence that a series of attacks on Tesla vehicles and dealerships are coordinated despite such claims from Tesla CEO Elon Musk and President Donald Trump.

At least 10 Tesla dealerships, charging stations and facilities have been hit by vandals, many of whom have lit cars on fire, while a growing collection of videos posted to social media have shown people defacing and damaging Tesla vehicles. One website appeared to encourage people to target Tesla vehicles, publishing a map with the information of dozens of Tesla owners and Tesla facilities. It’s unknown who started the site.

The attacks have come as Musk has emerged as one of the brightest flashpoints of an already tumultuous second Trump administration, leading a sweeping effort to cut large swaths of the federal government. Musk has decried the attacks on Teslas, and on Thursday claimed on his social media platform X that the attacks were “coordinated.” He did not provide evidence….

Trump has also claimed the attacks have been coordinated. In an interview Wednesday on Fox News, he said without evidence that  “people that are very highly political on the left” are paying the vandals.

Trump has called the destruction of Tesla property domestic terrorism, and Attorney General Pam Bondi announced charges on Thursday against three people accused of vandalizing Tesla properties in Oregon, South Carolina and Washington state.

Publicly available court documents for the three people make no mention of coordination, an NBC News review found.

Experts and law enforcement officials nationwide from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the two federal agencies investigating the attacks, all told NBC News they have found no evidence of any coordination around the attacks.

More details at NBC News.

I’m just heartened by the rising public anger over Trump and Musk working to destroy our democratic form of government and turn our country into a dictatorship.

I’ll end with this piece by David Smith in The Guardian: The Trump Administration is descending into authoritarianism.

Entering the magnificent great hall of the US Department of Justice, Donald Trump stopped for a moment to admire his portrait then took to a specially constructed stage where two art deco statues, depicting the “Spirit of Justice” and “Majesty of Justice”, had been carefully concealed behind a blue velvet curtain.

The president, who since last year is also a convicted criminal, proceeded to air grievances, utter a profanity and accuse the news media of doing “totally illegal” things, without offering evidence. “I just hope you can all watch for it,” he told justice department employees, “but it’s totally illegal.”

Cat Lady on a Couch, by Sharon Bursic

Trump’s breach of the justice department’s traditional independence last week was neither shocking nor surprising. His speech quickly faded from the fast and furious news cycle. But future historians may regard it as a milestone on a road leading the world’s oldest continuousdemocracy to a once unthinkable destination.

Eviscerating the federal government and subjugating Congress; defying court orders and delegitimising judges; deporting immigrants and arresting protesters without due process; chilling free speech at universities and cultural institutions; cowing news outlets with divide-and-rule. Add a rightwing media ecosystem manufacturing consent and obeyance in advance, along with a weak and divided opposition offering feeble resistance. Join all the dots, critics say, and America is sleepwalking into authoritarianism.

“These are flashing red lights here,” Tara Setmayer, a former Republican communications director turned Trump critic. “We are approaching Defcon 1 for our democracy and a lot of people in the media and the opposition leadership don’t seem to be communicating that to the American people. That is the biggest danger of the moment we’re in now: the normalisation of it.”

Much was said and written by journalists and Democrats during last year’s election campaign arguing that Trump, who instigated a coup against the US government on January 6, 2021, could endanger America’s 240-year experiment with democracy if he returned to power. In a TV interview he had promised to be “dictator” but only on “day one”. Sixty days in, the only question is whether the warnings went far enough.

The 45th and 47th president has wasted no time in launching a concerted effort to consolidate executive power, undermine checks and balances and challenge established legal and institutional norms. And he is making no secret of his strongman ambitions.

Trump, 78, has declared “We are the federal law” and posted a social media image of himself wearing a crown with the words “Long live the king”. He also channeled Napoleon with the words: “He who saves his country does not violate any law.” And JD Vance has stated that “judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power”.

Trump quickly pardoned those who attacked the US Capitol on January 6, placed loyalists in key positions within the FBI and military and purged the justice department, which also suffered resignations in response to the dismissal of corruption charges against New York mayor Eric Adams after his cooperation on hardline immigration measures.

The president now has the courts in his sights. Last weekend the White House defied a judge’s verbal order blocking it from invoking the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 law meant only to be used in wartime, to justify the deportation of 250 Venezuelan alleged gang members to El Salvador, where they will be held in a 40,000-person megaprison.

Read the rest at The Guardian.

That’s it for me today. What’s on your mind?