Outside a Social Security office, fear, lines and misinformation

[dalton99a]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/04/02/social-security-doge-lines-iowa-beneficiaries/

Outside a Social Security office, fear, lines and misinformation
Retirees are flocking to the agency’s office in Des Moines, mistakenly thinking they have to prove their identity anew or their checks will stop.
April 2, 2025 at 6:00 a.m. EDT
By Annie Gowen

DES MOINES — They began lining up two hours before the Social Security office opened — huddled against a sharp April cold, clutching convenience store coffees, the steam rising in chill coming off the river that flows through Des Moines.

Some carried files of important documents — an original of a marriage or birth certificate, a Medicare application — or printouts of forms they couldn’t seem to manage to submit online.

Many expressed worry about the upcoming changes at the Social Security Administration and how those might affect the benefits it provides 73 million disabled, elderly or young Americans. For 40 percent of seniors, that monthly check is their sole source of income.

While President Donald Trump has said he won’t touch Social Security, his billionaire adviser Elon Musk has denigrated the system as a “Ponzi scheme.” Cost-cutting teams from Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service have slashed jobs and functions. The result: a flood of worried beneficiaries, website crashes and chaos.

Long lines and wait times were already common at this office, the biggest in Iowa, located between boxy new lofts in a low-slung, red-trimmed building on the fringes of the city’s downtown.

But help here has been complicated by new rules requiring beneficiaries to come in person if they cannot register online, according to Jeremy Maske, president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 836, which represents about 100 Social Security workers in this state and Nebraska.

Some recipients are showing up because of confusion over what they do and don’t need to do to prove they are still alive.

They’re “experiencing longer wait times on the phone, if they can get through,” Maske said. “They’re experiencing the same type of fear and trauma the employees are — and are worried they’re going to lose their benefits.”

...

[Irish_Dem]

1. Trump loves scaring the hell out of old people.

Sadist.

[gab13by13]

4. It's not scare tactics, it's real.

I’m an old person and I’m not stupid, I understand Occam’s Razor.

Malcolm Nance at times exaggerates but today he said that SSA is 90% gone, only the computers remain. Yeah, he is a bit over the top but not far off.

[Irish_Dem]

12. It is scaring us because we know this is life or death.

Some people won't make it.

[Skittles]

13. correct

when people RELY on something, they cannot afford to be UNSURE of the procedure

President Musk and his lapdog Trump THRIVE on chaos

[Irish_Dem]

14. Chaos, fear, hurting people.

[GreenWave]

2. There was a recent email explaining we all had to re-identify. HOWEVER it came from outside the SS.

Scam? Most likely.

[gab13by13]

6. I used user name and password to log in

and was told on line I had to change the way I sign in to a more secure method.

[GreenWave]

9. That happened to me at home too. But I didn't do it and nothing changed.

But at my office the email was unsolicited and therefore, suspect as SS does not have my office email AFAIK.

[yellowdogintexas]

19. that happened to me at least a year ago. nt

[yellow dahlia]

17. Did your email have a hyperlink in it?

What is the hyperlink? Don't link on it? But what was the hyperlink address, if you can see it?

I also got a dubious email. I am trying to figure out what is going on. I am gathering anecdotes here.

Did yours come from an ssa.gov address?

Thanks for any insight you have.

[GreenWave]

21. i have to delete immediately or take a course in internet safety in case IT planted a trap again.

It did not come from SS source and they do not have my work email.

[bdamomma]

3. This regime

is so evil. They probably had issues with their parents to do so much damage to seniors. Horrible, they are treating seniors with such vitriol and hatred.

[Blues Heron]

5. DOGE lines

Elon is an economic terrorist

[gab13by13]

8. Musk is just following Project 2025

[Blues Heron]

10. true dat

[Silent Type]

7. Lots of unnecessary fear being pushed by some people.

[gab13by13]

11. Unnecessary fear or Occam's Razor?

As Irish_Dem puts it, we are a colony of Russia.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

15. I'm glad I long ago applied for and started collecting Social Security.

People seriously need to stop panicking. Perhaps they should just stop watching Fox News. Those of us who don't watch it, understand that SS isn't going away. Republicans who don't have elderly mothers and grandmothers may think it's unimportant, or that how someone files doesn't matter, but they will learn otherwise.

If my SS is messed with I'll need to find some Republican to harass. As it happens I live in New Mexico, a highly Democratic state, and my two Senators and our three representatives are very good Dems.

[gab13by13]

16. SS has already been messed with.

So many cuts that lengthy delays will cause it to self-destruct.

Google what former SSA commissioner Martin O’Malley has to say about SS being programmed to fail.

When someone applies for disability and it takes over a year, that is happening now.

[yellow dahlia]

18. Thank you for sharing this article.

I am trying to gather the stories of what is happening. There is conflicting information. I am trying to get to the bottom of some of this.

[Coventina]

20. I wonder how many of them voted for this?

Iowa tells me probably the majority.

I'm trying hard to feel sorry for them, but it's not happening........