February 20, 2025 | Reading Time: 4 minutes
Trump, Social Security and the mugging of the century
How the Democrats can be crime-fighters.
The Republicans and the very obscenely rich have wanted to “privatize” Social Security and Medicare pretty much since the start of both safety-net programs. They have tried a few times, most memorably after the 2004 presidential election, and every time they did, they got zapped.
Things are different now. The Republicans have a felon in the White House who is not afraid of political blowback the same way George W. Bush was. Donald Trump is not afraid of anything, as the Supreme Court has declared him infallible, immunizing him against criminal liability, encouraging him to break any law he damn well pleases.
Indeed, he’s already referred to himself as a king.
What the Republicans could not hope to do legally, democratically or constitutionally – “privatize” our great social insurance programs – they can now hope to do illegally, undemocratically and unconstitutionally, as Trump positions himself to kick people off Social Security and Medicare on the basis that the programs are lousy with fraud.
I don’t know if Trump and the GOP will succeed, no one does, but I do know the effort demands an equal and opposite reaction. So far, however, I don’t see that from Democratic leadership. I see potential for it, but not the reality. The closest was in a January 3 speech from Hakeem Jeffries. From the speaker’s podium, the minority leader said:
Social Security and Medicare are not entitlement programs, they are earned benefits. Hardworking American taxpayers paid into Social Security and Medicare every day, every week, every month, every year, throughout their entire adult life. They earned those benefits, worked hard for those benefits, and deserve those benefits.
So as Democrats, our promise to the American people is that we will fight hard to make sure that no one in this town takes away Social Security or Medicare from the American people. Not now. Not ever. No means never.
Our position is that it is not acceptable to cut Social Security, cut Medicare, cut Medicaid, cut veterans benefits or cut nutritional assistance from children and families in order to pay for massive tax breaks for billionaires and wealthy corporations.
House Democrats will fight hard to protect working-class Americans and the things that matter to them, not the wealthy, the well-off and the well-connected.
Keep your hands off Social Security and Medicare.
This is a good speech in that it pushes back against efforts by the Republicans and sympathetic reporters to define Social Security and Medicare as “entitlements,” with the connotation being that lazy good-for-nothing Americans feel entitled to “government handouts.”
As Jeffries said, Social Security and Medicare are not freebies. You pay for them. Everyone pays for them. You have been paying your entire adult life, and by the time you can’t work anymore, because of old age or sickness, the Republicans better believe you are entitled to them.
However, I would like to see the Democrats, especially the leaders among them, take this pro-working class position to the next level.
Their rhetoric must change, as the terrain has changed. We are no longer experiencing a Republican Party that is constrained, as it was in 2004, by the rule of law, the Constitution, the courts or even public opinion. We are experiencing a GOP that has a chance to get what it has long wanted without the hassle of being held accountable for it.
As Jeffries said, Social Security and Medicare are earned. Everyone has paid their share. (Unless your income exceeds $176,100. That’s the Social Security cap. There is no cap on Medicare, though.) Everyone has socked money safely away in a giant government account for that time in their lives, usually in their late 60s, when they really need it.
Because the programs are paid for, any attempt to take them away, morally speaking, should rise to a level much higher than the usual abstract hair-splitting over whether Social Security and Medicare are “entitlements” or not. Any attempt to take them away rises to the level of a crime, which is to say, theft, more precisely, attempted robbery.
CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE FOR JUST $6 A MONTH!
Click here to leave a tip. $10? Thanks!
Donald Trump wants us to believe that Social Security and Medicare are so lousy with fraud that he has no choice but to start canceling payments. This is a lie. (You can read here about where that lie came from, but you won’t be surprised to learn it came from Elon Musk.)
It’s a lie that’s potentially as great as The Big Lie. Just as Trump based his attempted robbery of the American people, on January 6, 2021, on lies about a fraudulent election, he’s setting himself up for another attempted robbery with lies about fraudulent safety-net programs.
I think it’s important to say that if Trump is really determined to cancel payments to Americans who have paid into these benefit programs their entire adult lives, there is no mechanism that can stop him. He controls the bureaucracy and the Department of Justice. He controls the Republicans in the Congress. The courts are close to irrelevancy.
Anyway, thieves don’t obey the law. They’re thieves.
Same thing for thieving presidents.
What can be done is applying enough pressure on the Republicans so that they reclaim their constitutional authority – by passing laws that protect Social Security and Medicare from thieving presidents, or even impeaching and removing him – or so that Democratic candidates are in an ideal position to run against and unseat Republicans incumbents.
That pressure could come from the Democrats, especially their leaders among them, taking their rhetoric to the next level – from hairsplitting over the true meaning of Social Security and Medicare to the morally unimpeachable allegation that any attempt to take programs away from Americans who have spent their lifetimes paying for them is burglary.
It’s one thing for the Democrats to say they stand with “working-class Americans and the things that matter to them.” It’s another to say they stand against a criminal president and his criminal organization of a party, both of which are trying to mug Americans in broad daylight.
They can’t take your money legally, democratically or constitutionally. But they now have the opportunity to get it the old-fashioned way.
The Democrats can be crime-fighters.
First, they have to name the crime.
John Stoehr is the editor of the Editorial Board. Find him @editorialboard.bsky.social
.
Want to comment on this post?
Click here to upgrade to a premium membership.