Is the SSA an arm of the GOP?

In a February 2005 report, the Minority Staff of the United States House of Representatives Committee on Government Reform investigated the apparent change in the Social Security Administration public communications practices under the current administration. Recent communications suggest the SSA has modified its communications to build public support for President Bush’s Social Security privatization plan. The information in the PDF below is a summary of the findings of the investigation and additional evidence of the politicization of the Social Security Administration and the systematic shift toward the use of scare tactics in communications with the public.

Read about the politicization of the Social Security Administration (PDF).

Social Security Anniversaries Through the Years: 70th Gets the Shaft

At a recent meeting, the Social Security Administration informed their employees that they had no plans to conduct any celebration for the 70th anniversary of the August 14, 1935 signing of legislation by Franklin Delano Roosevelt that created Social Security.

This dramatic change in practice was a shock to SSA employees who participated in the grand celebrations that the SSA conducted to commemorate the 60th anniversary. Just ten years ago, the SSA directed all field offices to participate in the anniversary celebrations...and participate they did! The SSA website has some 25 pages documenting the festivities.

DeMint Plan: Washington's Most Rabid Privatizer Turns to Gimmicks to Breathe Life into Dying Effort to Privatize Social Security

Gimmick Won't Fool Americans Who Overwhelmingly Oppose Privatization

Washington, DC -- Today, U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) and other Republicans Senators will unveil a plan to privatize Social Security, cut benefits and explode the national debt -- but they're unlikely to admit to any of the above. DeMint's plan would direct funds from the Social Security surplus which has been financed with Social Security payroll taxes to establish private accounts. The DeMint plan would increase the national debt and would move up the date of Social Security's financial shortfall. Published reports have inaccurately suggested that this plan -- because it is limited to establishing private accounts thru the current surplus -- is a set back for the President. However, this more incremental approach to privatization is still just that -- an effort to fully privatizae Social Security -- as a top GOP Senate aide told Congressional Quarterly this week.

"This is a political proposal more than a policy proposal, political in the sense that you've established the principle of personal accounts," said the senior GOP aide, who referred to it as a "nose-of-the-camel-under-the-tent proposal." [Congressional Quarterly, June 21, 2005].