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By Aliss Higham
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Elon Musk has taken aim at alleged fraud and waste at the Social Security Administration (SSA), prompting some anger online.
Newsweek has contacted DOGE for comment via email outside of regular working hours.
Why It Matters
Musk is unofficially running the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which has been tasked with reducing federal spending. He has previously made several claims regarding the SSA that have caused widespread confusion.
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What To Know
Speaking as part of a wider interview about DOGE's role on Fox Business Network with Larry Kudlow, Musk made new comments about getting rid of "waste and fraud in entitlements spending," although he did not refer directly to Social Security payments.
He did not say he directly wants to cut any form of benefits claimed by Americans, whether that be retirement, disability or other separate health insurance programs like Medicaid and Medicare.
"That's the big one to eliminate—maybe half a trillion or 600, 700 billion a year," he said of supposed wasteful spending.
Musk also said that federal entitlements are "a mechanism by which the Democrats attract and retain illegal immigrants by essentially paying them to come here and then turning them into voters."
Musk also reiterated a previous point he had made about SSA data systems that store the data of deceased former recipients.
"Why are there 20 million people who are definitely dead marked as alive in the Social Security database?" he said.
He added: "As the president said, we have an enormous number of people marked as alive who are 160—didn't know the country was that healthy."
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Online Anger
Musk's latest comments have been deliberated on social media. Posting on X, formerly Twitter, former Transport Secretary Pete Buttigieg wrote: "There were howls of protest and denial from the GOP any time we [Democrats] pointed out that Republicans want to cut Social Security. Now the most powerful official in the White House goes on TV and calls it 'the big one to eliminate.'"
Newsweek has been unable to immediately contact Buttigieg for comment.
Bishop Talbert Swan posted: "The richest man on Earth, who pays little to no taxes, thinks your grandmother's medicine and your grandfather's check are the problem—not corporate greed, not tax breaks for the wealthy, not trillion-dollar war budgets. This level of wickedness is staggering."
Conservative media personality Charlie Kirk came to Musk's defense.
"Elon Musk just asking common sense questions any American would want to know and receiving death threats, boycotts, and ridicule for doing so," he wrote. "Elon is a patriot."
Are Dead People Getting Social Security?
Musk's previous comments, that were not dissimilar to his latest ones, have caused widespread confusion over whether long-dead Americans are receiving benefits from the SSA.
The confusion has arisen from the SSA's software system, which relies on the COBOL programming language and lacks a specific date type. As a result, entries with missing or incomplete birth dates may default to a reference point over 150 years in the past.
Musk posted data from this system on X in February. He posted a spreadsheet of data showing "the numbers of people in each age bucket with the death field set to FALSE!"
It also included more than 10 million people listed as being above the age of 100, including one who is recorded as being between 360 and 369 years of age. The U.S. has roughly 100,000 centenarians, according to the Pew Research Center.
The total figures included in Musk's post add up to considerably more than the number of beneficiaries paid by the SSA every month, which was around 73 million as of January. The total of the figures presented was also higher than the U.S. population, which was around 341 million during the last census in 2020.
Reports from the SSA's Office of the Inspector General in March 2023 and July 2024 indicate that the agency has yet to implement a new system for accurately annotating death information in its database. This database contained approximately 18.9 million Social Security numbers belonging to individuals born in 1920 or earlier who were not officially marked as deceased. However, this does not necessarily mean they were in receipt of benefits.
A July 2024 report from Social Security's inspector general found that between fiscal years 2015 and 2022, the federal agency distributed nearly $8.6 trillion in benefits. Some $71.8 billion of this—less than 1 percent—was classified as improper payments, with the majority being overpayments made to living recipients, which are in most cases required to be paid back.
That didn't stop President Donald Trump from repeating the claim in his address to Congress earlier this month. The president said Social Security databases show millions of people aged above 100 years and "money is being paid to many of them."
The SSA's acting commissioner, Lee Dudek, acknowledged recent reporting about the number of people older than age 100 who may be receiving benefits from Social Security.
"The reported data are people in our records with a Social Security number who do not have a date of death associated with their record. These individuals are not necessarily receiving benefits," he said in a statement.
Do Immigrants Get Social Security?
Whether an immigrant is eligible to collect Social Security benefits depends on their legal status.
On its website, the Social Security Administration explains: "Lawfully present noncitizens of the United States who meet all eligibility requirements can qualify for Social Security benefits. This rule also applies to noncitizens authorized to work in the United States who got a Social Security number after December 2003."
Immigrants living in the U.S. legally can qualify for Social Security retirement benefits if they attain enough work credits over the course of their careers. To earn such credits, immigrants need to obtain a Social Security number and pay Social Security taxes.
Immigrants living in the U.S. illegally are not eligible for Social Security retirement benefits, but those who entered the U.S. illegally before receiving temporary permission to stay may be eligible for Supplemental Security Income (SSI)—or disability benefits—if they meet certain criteria.
What People Are Saying
Trump, during his address to Congress on March 4: "Believe it or not, government databases list 4.7 million Social Security members from people aged 100 to 109 years old. It lists 3.6 million people from ages 110 to 119. I don't know any of them. I know some people that are rather elderly, but not quite that elderly."
Alex Beene, a financial literacy instructor for the University of Tennessee at Martin, told Newsweek: "More than anything, the findings should alert the new administration to how antiquated many of the databases of government agencies are that normally produce errors such as these. The mission to uncover government waste is a valid one, but it needs to be assessed based on how many of these agencies currently operate, their rules and procedures, and how those can be fine-tuned moving forward to prevent additional problems."
What Happens Next
Since the Trump administration began in January, the SSA has undergone a slew of changes under the helm of acting commissioner Dudek. These include staffing reductions and the closure of some internal departments. Forthcoming additional changes are likely as DOGE continues on its mission to cut federal outgoings.
Update 3/11/25, 08:47 a.m. ET: This article has been updated to clarify the interview was broadcast on Fox Business Network.
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