February 12, 2025
Andy Markowitz
Andy Markowitz
67 million Americans receive benefits that they have earned
As the new administration works to quickly implement the agenda President Donald Trump outlined on the campaign trail, some AARP members have raised questions about protecting Social Security and Medicare.
Bill Sweeney, AARP’s senior vice president for government affairs, has been in regular contact with administration officials. Amid potentially sweeping changes in how the federal government operates, we asked Sweeney about what he’s hearing and how AARP is fighting to protect Social Security and Medicare and ensure that people 50-plus are heard. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: There has been a lot of talk about access — specifically, who has access — to the federal payment system. What does this mean for Social Security benefits?
A: At AARP, I’m proud that we have maintained strong, nonpartisan relationships with top government officials for over 65 years, regardless of who’s in the White House. We’ve met with key administration officials who reassured us that Social Security payments are not affected and will continue to be made as they always have. Based on these conversations, I have no reason to doubt those reassurances.
Q: The administration says it aims to shrink the federal workforce. How do you think that will affect Social Security customer service?
A: That is very unclear right now. On his first day in office, the president issued an executive order with a hiring freeze for all federal workers but specifically exempted Social Security, Medicare and veterans benefits. That said, Congress had frozen Social Security’s budget last November, so Social Security has been operating under a hiring freeze, because they don’t have a stable budget for 2025 and can’t make long-term hiring decisions until they get one. We've been pushing Congress to give Social Security a clear budget for 2025 so that they can make hiring decisions, improve their operations and ensure that you get the customer service you deserve.
Q: The Social Security Administration (SSA) had succeeded in reducing phone wait times, one of the key customer service metrics AARP has been talking about. They had gotten that down to about 11 minutes on average last fall, but it has gone back up to almost half an hour. What can be done to bring those wait times down?
A: I would say, first, it’s a big deal that those wait times got all the way down to 11 minutes from a high of almost 40 minutes last year. That took years of advocacy by AARP to achieve. It shows that when people are focused and committed to improving efficiency, we can make a really big difference.
There are a few things that I suspect are impacting wait times right now. Around tax season, people need forms, they need to get information for their taxes, so people are needing to call Social Security to get information. The second thing is that there’s all this news around data and benefits that’s really confusing and creating a lot of worry. I’m sure Social Security is getting a lot of phone calls as a result of that. Finally, there’s this new law that Congress passed last year, before they left office, giving increased benefits to about 3 million retired government employees who are all wondering when they are going to start seeing their money.
So, there’s a lot happening. I think one of the best things you could do is use My Social Security at ssa.gov to see if there are services or answers to some of your questions.
Q: You mentioned the new law passed at the end of last year — the SSA said it could take more than a year to fully implement that law, which is not just changing benefits going forward but was made retroactive for a year. What’s the holdup?
A: This is a big transition. About 3 million retired employees who worked for mostly state and local governments, a few that worked for the federal government for a long time, they were working in jobs that were covered by Social Security and also working in government jobs that were not covered by Social Security. SSA has a very complicated set of data that they need to process around the benefits these folks are entitled to. They’ve got some changes that they need to make to the computer systems that calculate this data.
Congress passed this law literally on their very last day in session, but they didn’t provide Social Security with any additional money. As I mentioned, back in November, Congress left Social Security with a frozen budget and not enough money to do the things Social Security was already being asked to do, and then they gave them a big new project to deal with. SSA is scrambling to get that done as quickly as possible. They are keeping their website updated, and there’s some helpful information on there about what to expect.
Q: What action is AARP taking on other issues important to older Americans that could be affected by the change of administration, like drug prices or family caregiving?
A: We have a 65-year track record of working with administrations, no matter what party they’re from, no matter who’s in the White House, no matter who controls the Congress, to advocate effectively for the needs of Americans who are 50-plus, and we’re going to continue to do that.
We’re working hard to pass a family caregiver tax credit this year and I think we’re making some really good progress. There are 48 million Americans who take care of a loved one at home. They don’t get any sort of extra help, but the work they’re doing is saving taxpayers billions of dollars. We want to make sure they can keep some of their hard-earned money with a tax credit to help offset those caregiving expenses.
We’re also working on a number of other issues, whether it’s protecting Social Security or fighting for affordable housing or making sure that health care is more affordable. We’re not going to stop fighting. Medicare is continuing to move forward with negotiating lower drug prices with the big drug companies. There are 15 new drugs that need to be negotiated this year. AARP will continue to fight these fights every day for Americans 50-plus.
Bill Sweeney, AARP’s senior vice president for government affairs, has been in regular contact with administration officials. Amid potentially sweeping changes in how the federal government operates, we asked Sweeney about what he’s hearing and how AARP is fighting to protect Social Security and Medicare and ensure that people 50-plus are heard. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: There has been a lot of talk about access — specifically, who has access — to the federal payment system. What does this mean for Social Security benefits?
A: At AARP, I’m proud that we have maintained strong, nonpartisan relationships with top government officials for over 65 years, regardless of who’s in the White House. We’ve met with key administration officials who reassured us that Social Security payments are not affected and will continue to be made as they always have. Based on these conversations, I have no reason to doubt those reassurances.
Q: The administration says it aims to shrink the federal workforce. How do you think that will affect Social Security customer service?
A: That is very unclear right now. On his first day in office, the president issued an executive order with a hiring freeze for all federal workers but specifically exempted Social Security, Medicare and veterans benefits. That said, Congress had frozen Social Security’s budget last November, so Social Security has been operating under a hiring freeze, because they don’t have a stable budget for 2025 and can’t make long-term hiring decisions until they get one. We've been pushing Congress to give Social Security a clear budget for 2025 so that they can make hiring decisions, improve their operations and ensure that you get the customer service you deserve.
Q: The Social Security Administration (SSA) had succeeded in reducing phone wait times, one of the key customer service metrics AARP has been talking about. They had gotten that down to about 11 minutes on average last fall, but it has gone back up to almost half an hour. What can be done to bring those wait times down?
A: I would say, first, it’s a big deal that those wait times got all the way down to 11 minutes from a high of almost 40 minutes last year. That took years of advocacy by AARP to achieve. It shows that when people are focused and committed to improving efficiency, we can make a really big difference.
There are a few things that I suspect are impacting wait times right now. Around tax season, people need forms, they need to get information for their taxes, so people are needing to call Social Security to get information. The second thing is that there’s all this news around data and benefits that’s really confusing and creating a lot of worry. I’m sure Social Security is getting a lot of phone calls as a result of that. Finally, there’s this new law that Congress passed last year, before they left office, giving increased benefits to about 3 million retired government employees who are all wondering when they are going to start seeing their money.
So, there’s a lot happening. I think one of the best things you could do is use My Social Security at ssa.gov to see if there are services or answers to some of your questions.
Q: You mentioned the new law passed at the end of last year — the SSA said it could take more than a year to fully implement that law, which is not just changing benefits going forward but was made retroactive for a year. What’s the holdup?
A: This is a big transition. About 3 million retired employees who worked for mostly state and local governments, a few that worked for the federal government for a long time, they were working in jobs that were covered by Social Security and also working in government jobs that were not covered by Social Security. SSA has a very complicated set of data that they need to process around the benefits these folks are entitled to. They’ve got some changes that they need to make to the computer systems that calculate this data.
Congress passed this law literally on their very last day in session, but they didn’t provide Social Security with any additional money. As I mentioned, back in November, Congress left Social Security with a frozen budget and not enough money to do the things Social Security was already being asked to do, and then they gave them a big new project to deal with. SSA is scrambling to get that done as quickly as possible. They are keeping their website updated, and there’s some helpful information on there about what to expect.
Q: What action is AARP taking on other issues important to older Americans that could be affected by the change of administration, like drug prices or family caregiving?
A: We have a 65-year track record of working with administrations, no matter what party they’re from, no matter who’s in the White House, no matter who controls the Congress, to advocate effectively for the needs of Americans who are 50-plus, and we’re going to continue to do that.
We’re working hard to pass a family caregiver tax credit this year and I think we’re making some really good progress. There are 48 million Americans who take care of a loved one at home. They don’t get any sort of extra help, but the work they’re doing is saving taxpayers billions of dollars. We want to make sure they can keep some of their hard-earned money with a tax credit to help offset those caregiving expenses.
We’re also working on a number of other issues, whether it’s protecting Social Security or fighting for affordable housing or making sure that health care is more affordable. We’re not going to stop fighting. Medicare is continuing to move forward with negotiating lower drug prices with the big drug companies. There are 15 new drugs that need to be negotiated this year. AARP will continue to fight these fights every day for Americans 50-plus.
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