Administrative costs are less than 1% of Social Security spending. Since almost all Social Security spending goes towards benefits, which are set by statute, gutting the agency won’t save money for participants.
The only way that slashing the number of workers will save large sums money is by making it hard for people to access benefits they’ve earned. Such backdoor benefit cuts, and making a popular government program look bad, are the real goals behind DOGE attacks on Social Security.
A team of DOGE programmers installed themselves behind closed doors at SSA headquarters. The DOGE team at SSA, one of the largest, embarked on what a former chief of staff described as a “hostile takeover,” with an armed guard posted outside their office. When the inexperienced and improperly vetted DOGE team demanded unrestricted access to Social Security databases, the acting commissioner resigned in protest and was replaced by Leland Dudek, a mid-level manager who boasted on social media about circumventing SSA management to help DOGE. At least one DOGE associate accessed this data remotely from the Office of Personnel Management, the site of the most serious data breach in U.S. government history. A judge later issued a temporary restraining order limiting access to SSA data by DOGE associates.
SSA, under a new DOGE-friendly Acting Commissioner Leland Dudek, announced plans to reduce staffing by 7,000 employees through incentives and layoffs. This 12% reduction is a target—many more SSA employees could leave or be forced out. Cutbacks have affected all agency personnel, including critical and difficult-to-replace programmers and cybersecurity experts. Morale was already low at the agency before DOGE staff started bullying employees, threatening layoffs, and offering buyouts. Meanwhile, the DOGE-friendly acting commissioner has instituted hiring and overtime freezes and even threatened to shut down operations.
SSA was already stretched to the breaking point after years of underfunding. Even before the DOGE cuts, staffing at the agency was at a 50-year low. Meanwhile, more people are receiving Social Security benefits than ever before thanks to the aging Baby Boomer generation. Despite years of flat funding that failed to keep up with an escalating workload, House Republicans were gunning for cuts to Social Security’s administrative budget even before DOGE’s slash-and-burn efforts.
Social Security is at a breaking point. Former Commissioner Martin O’Malley has noted that not only has DOGE set the stage for a total collapse of the system, but this brain drain is being paid for by Social Security participants. Wait times for phone and in-person appointments have already skyrocketed, with half of callers hanging up before they have a chance to speak with anyone. The large number of people attempting to use the online portal crashed the system four times last month.
DOGE also announced plans to shutter or shrink Social Security Administration offices. This is part of a broader plan to terminate leases on thousands of federal offices around the country with the goal of reducing federal office space by half even as federal workers are being recalled back from remote work. These efforts have raised concerns that offices sold at fire-sale prices could be leased back later at a higher cost to taxpayers. SSA offices slated for closing include the Maryland headquarters, regional offices, and dozens of field offices that handle in-person appointments needed to process complex transactions.
DOGE attacks on the Social Security Administration have been extremely destructive, and some of the damage will be very difficult to reverse. However, Social Security has never missed a payment in its 89-year history, and it would be political suicide for the Trump Administration and Republican Party to allow this to happen under their watch. However, the Trump Administration, with DOGE’s help, is making it hard for people to claim benefits in the first place, harming participants and unfairly tarnishing Social Security’s reputation.
If it ain’t broke, DOGE will break it. As former Commissioner Martin O’Malley warned, “When they can break it, they can say, ‘Aha! We told you! This program never worked, and we were just ripping the band aid off.’” Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren told Frank Bisignano, the self-described “DOGE person” who Trump has nominated to run the agency, that the only way to significantly reduce Social Security spending without Congress instituting unpopular benefit cuts is to make it very hard for people to access them. If this makes people frustrated with the agency, that’s a plus for an administration that wants you to believe that government is broken.
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