Bulwark Takes - Is This Trump Official The Most Ridiculous One Yet? (w/ Arthur Delaney)

Episode Date: March 19, 2025

Sam Stein and Arthur Delaney dive into Social Security CHAOS, Trump policy shifts, and political maneuvering that could impact millions. Is the Trump administration playing politics with benefits: Janet Mills and Leland Dudek drama in Maine.

Hey guys, welcome back. I'm Sam Stein, Managing Editor at The Bulwark. I'm joined by one of our premier guests. Truly, not a diamond in the rough, just a diamond. Arthur Delaney of Huffington Post. Sorry, HuffPost. I forgot. Big changes over there. We're going to be talking about Social Security, a serious topic. We're going to have a little fun at the end, but we're going to do the serious stuff at the beginning because there's some actual substantive changes happening to the program that are not getting enough attention. And then the administration of it is being done in a very weird kind of political matter that I think is worth touching on. Before we get to that, you know what to do. Subscribe to the feed.

We're crushing it, but we want to crush it more. So give us your subscription, please. All right, Artie, thanks for joining us. Appreciate it. I want to start with the substantive stuff. Obviously, there's been a lot of changes at the Social Security Administration, basically around how the program is going to be administered. They're not privatizing the program as you would traditionally understand it. I mean, as you and I traditionally understand it, that means, you know, putting the benefits into the private market. Right. But what they are doing is they're taking part of the administration of the program and changing it in a way that might give it over to private companies and so on and so forth. The big story from this week was that you would now, if you are trying to apply for benefits, could no longer do them by phone. Maybe not apply for benefits, but get changes to your

bank account or things like that. You can no longer do it by phone. You have to do it in person. Can you describe sort of the reasons for this change and just how disruptive it might be? Right. It's part of the broader Doge effort to flatten like every federal agency. And what they're doing at Social Security is restricting the ability of people to make changes to their accounts or apply for, say, retirement benefits over the phone. Already, they want you to use the social security website where you can log in and create an id and of course you know a lot of older people they don't do that so uh they phone and so basically a big change that they announced tuesday would be that for transactions where you have to verify your identity they're going to insist that you come in and do this in person.

I don't get it. I got to be honest. I don't get it. They're cutting the number of people who work at the SSA. So already there's less personnel to talk to for this stuff. I assume that they were going to try to automate a lot of these things and digitize them. But this is the opposite. Yeah.

I mean, there is some of that automation and AI stuff going on, but I can make this make sense for you. You've heard Donald Trump talk about how millions of people who supposedly are 200 years old are receiving benefits. So if you're dead, you're not coming in. Gotcha. Yeah. Elon Musk is like, this agency is full of fraud. So they are making a change that would appear totally contrary to the idea of convenient public service in order to fight this supposed fraud. Are they explicit about that as the reason for this? They don't want people showing up? They are not explicit that it's the 200 year olds like cryptkeeper accounts they are saying just fraud in general because they say a one of the more common social security

frauds is a relative or somebody you don't even know will say i need to switch the bank account where i'm getting my direct deposit and then they'll steal your benefits and so supposedly to cut down on that. That's the fraud they're cutting down on. But the point is it's fraud in general. Are people not freaking out about this? Like I'm not a genius about these types of things, but it strikes me that like old people being forced to like –

and disabled and infirm old people being forced to get up, go into a location, go through more hurdles in order to get their benefits that they've earned, would be a political loser. And that people who are in Congress would be like, you know what, maybe we shouldn't do this. Maybe this is a bad idea. These people are important in their key constituency. But I've heard very little in the way of pushback on this. There has been pushback, but it's piecemeal. You know, at the same time you're doing this, like you mentioned, they're shutting a bunch of the field offices. There are 1,200.

So there's fewer places to go to, but more requirements to go to those fewer places yes but uh okay tom cole a republican from oklahoma last week actually put out a statement uh saying that he had stopped them closing field offices there and in one place right so there's this small amount of pushback when it's you know it's like republicans can get their shit their cuts reversed because they have elon's direct line but democrats are screwed basically there there are other instances of Social Security field offices or building addresses that are put on the Doge contract cancellation website that then are taken off. As with everything else Doge, it's not done in really the most transparent manner and stuff comes and goes, you can't really trust that it's accurate. But they do intend to cut several thousand employees and perhaps dozens of field offices. I'm not sure about. I mean, it's just as crazy to me. This is thoughtful. I thought as long, long thought as the

third rail of politics. And they're just like, let's take a hold of it. You have a piece up about another Social Security Administration episode. This one involves the acting commissioner, a man named Leland Dudek. And we'll get to him because he's truly a character, a kind of underappreciated character in the Trump world, 2.0. But the backstory here is that there was some fight with the governor of Maine, Janet Mills, who was also in a fight with Donald Trump over transgender athletes. But this one involved policy changes at Social Security. What is the backstory here? So you know about how Janet Mills was in that fight with Donald Trump in February at the White House. All the governors were there. And he's like, we're going to get transgender athletes out of girls sports. And Maine wasn't on board with that. He singled her out. And she said, well, I'll see you in court.

And so he then said, well, we're going to cut off federal funding to Maine, which you can't really do for that reason anyway. That's the background. One day, Maine announced that instead of checking a box when you have a kid in order to get the social security number, you're going to have to go to the field office. Instead of doing this at the hospital when you're filling out the birth certificate paperwork and just say, yes, I request a number. number because the social security administration had canceled the enumeration at birth contract you have to make a another trip to a which is exactly what a what a new mother is eager to do you know things are pretty easy right now i'm gonna go with my kid and uh back into the hospital because that's fun yeah and you need that number i, you need it to get the key on your insurance right away. So it's a potentially big deal. They also canceled an electronic death registry thing that funeral homes would use to report deaths. So this was contrary to the mission of making sure 150-year-olds aren't collecting benefits. There was an uproar

over this. I can't imagine why. Yeah. Yeah. I think the entire main congressional delegation very quietly complained to the agency. There were a couple of public statements and they reversed it. And Leland Dudek, the acting commissioner, said, I'm sorry, that was a terrible mistake and an unnecessary burden on the people of Maine. OK. He didn't say why he did it. Yeah. What was the point of doing it in the first place?

No idea. Every state has these same contracts. No other state had them canceled. So the obvious. Hold on. I can put two and two together here. You tell me. Wait, you go on.

You tell the story. Seriously. Right. So I asked him right away away are you fighting with janet mills because she had a spat with trump they didn't say but last night on on tuesday night i should say dudek had a press call where they were announcing their new rule for you have to come in you can't use the phone for these different transactions and he took questions from a reporter so i asked him why did you cancel that contract in maine and he said questions from a reporter. So I asked him, why'd you cancel that contract in Maine? And he said, I screwed up.

It was a mistake. I didn't know what it was. I fully take responsibility. I said, yes, but are you sure that you weren't mad at Janet Mills, that the Janet Mills fight with Donald Trump had nothing to do with it? And he said, being a very communicative

and transparent person, I was upset with the governor. But it was still a weird contract. And I said, you mean you were upset with how Janet Mills treated Donald Trump at the White House? And he said, yes. When people get together, they should be respectful. So I said, so what you did was political retaliation. He said no. He maintained that the contract looked weird.

And yet, at the same time, that it was a total mistake to cancel it. So to me, it's- But just to be clear, he said he was upset with the governor. He acknowledged that he did cancel the contract. But he said the two are not related. Honestly, in my story on this, I said he suggested that this was a political, a politically motivated thing that he did to Maine. In other words, if he canceled that contract because he was mad at Janet Mills, we just witnessed something I don't think any of us expected. The weaponization of social

security yeah now now that's you know he he denied that it was a political retaliation i know he denies it but by definition he was upset and then he canceled the contract he he also alluded to an email he had sent in which he spelled this out in some way and I have asked them for that email I actually had already filed a FOIA request for emails from him we're professional

so it's not exactly the smoking gun that might be there. You know, we'll find out. We don't know. Have you talked to the Mills people about it? Janet Mills has not said anything about this to my knowledge. And I've reached out to them repeatedly. Right.

And, uh, they've not wanted to go there. I mean, they are dealing with the Trump administration on multiple fronts with the education department, the USDA, HHS. So maybe they're just not interested in poking the bear on this. Lesson learned. Don't fight the Trump administration on transgendered athletes. You might get screwed on social security. Let's talk about Dudek because boy, like candor.

It's interesting. I appreciate it. But he's quickly becoming sort of a repository for fairly head-scratching quotes. Again, I appreciate them. I think they're a great copy. And I mean, if the livelihood and well-being of our nation's seniors weren't so dependent on it, I'd find them more funny. But I still find them funny, I have to be honest. I'm going to read you a few quotes. You're going to tell me about the context here, and then maybe we'll figure out which one we think is our favorite. So this is from an email that he sent to SSA staff yesterday that you noted to me was pretty much earnest throughout,

but he had some great lines in them. This is a direct quote. Quote, personally, I have made some mistakes, which makes me human like you. I promise you this. I will continue to make mistakes, but I will learn from them. I mean, I like it, yeah, but I will continue to make mistakes is not something you normally hear from somebody in the administration. Ideally say, I will try not to make mistakes. Yeah, that's the usual construct. On the other hand, it's nice to, you know, we all do make mistakes. To err is human.

To err is human and to continue to err again and again, I guess, is also human. The promise to err is extremely human. Okay. All right. During a press call yesterday, he was asked, like you said, about why he canceled these death certificates or contracts and birth contracts with Maine. And he said, quote, I screwed up. I played the wrong move there. I'm new at this job.

It looked fishy. I think a little context about who he is real quick. Please. He's a mid-level guy at Social Security for a few years and had worked in other agencies. Right. He reached out to Doge when they came knocking at that agency and were not being answered by the top people.

Right. Top people said, stop that, Dudek. You are on leave. No. And then the top people refused to allow Doge into their sensitive data files with all of our information and they resigned. And so then the Doge people put Dudek in charge. So he has been a vessel for Doge and has actually,

I mean, we'll get to it, but that's why he's there because he's been helpful to them. And he's been apparently doing what they want. The real Horatio Alger story here. Yeah, and he kind of admits that he's a little bit in over his head, which is interesting. All right. From an internal meeting with staff this month, according to notes viewed by the Washington Post, he says this.

Doge people are learning and they will make mistakes. Again, he's obsessed with mistakes. But we have to let them see what is going on at SSA. I am relying on long-term career people to inform my work, but I am receiving decisions that are made without my input. I have to effectuate those decisions. Again, a cry for help almost. The make mistakes line is also he's repeating something Elon Musk says. Elon says I don't bet $1,000.

Everyone is just screwing up left and right, but it's a virtue. It's – Martin O'Malley, the previous commissioner of Social Security, told me that these mistakes could result in benefits not being paid for the first time. Yeah, small little side effect. It's just part of the process. All right. Last one from a recording of the same meeting attained by ProPublica. Quote, I work for the president. I need to do what the president tells me to do. I've had to make some tough decisions, some tough choices, choices I didn't agree with,

but the president wanted it and I did it. Yeah, I don't know. I guess I get it. You do serve at the, you know. Well, we don't know what decisions he was referring to. Yeah. What do you think he was referring to? It could be the main thing. We don't know. No reason has ever been given for the main contract cancellation. Right.

And I don't know if he's saying the president told him to do that or he believed that he was supporting the president, if that's what he was referring to, or it's simply that he knows. It would fit a sort of Trump characteristic to like, just be like, you know what? She crossed me in public. Let's screw her on this. Yeah.

Or maybe he's simply speaking about the reduction in force, which is definitely happening in a big way. They want to go from 57,000 to 50,000. There had been reports they wanted to cut their personnel by half, which would be really hard to imagine without infuriating people across the country. He's only acting, so what's the situation in getting a permanent commissioner? There is a guy nominated named Frank Bisignano who will have a confirmation hearing next Tuesday.

I'll be at that over in the Senate Finance Committee. I, for one, hope that we continue to get Dudek because I love him and I think he's good for quotes. Artie, thank you for unpacking this. It's always a pleasure talking to you. You really have your finger on the pulse. Let us know when you get that FOIA back, probably in what, 2027? Dudek said he's committed to transparency. Oh, I'm sure.

They never say that unless they really mean it. He has been incredibly transparent about his own thoughts and motivations and i i was surprised he had a press conference and maybe they'll hand it right over yeah let us know if they do and let us know if you hear from janna mills very curious to know if she feels like she was screwed over here uh arthur delaney the wizard of huffpost the chronicler of the social safety net one of the great friends of this podcast and YouTube page. Thank you so much, man. Really appreciate it. Thanks for having me, Sam.

Take care.