After his election, Donald Trump told NBC News that “we’re not touching Social Security,” other than to make it more efficient. But Elon Musk, who now wields enormous power in his role cutting government spending, has recently made comments critical of the program that are coming into conflict with Trump’s promise and worrying members of the president’s own party.
Those concerns have prompted some Trump allies to question whether the billionaire should continue to do so many media interviews, four people familiar with the matter told NBC News.
A particularly problematic remark came during Musk’s conversation with media personality Joe Rogan in late February, in which he described Social Security as “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.” A couple of weeks later, the billionaire once again went after Social Security, this time in an interview with Fox Business host Larry Kudlow. Musk, when discussing entitlement spending he deemed wasteful or fraudulent, said the program was “the big one to eliminate.”
Musk pointed to a 2024 report from the Government Accountability Office that estimated the entire federal government could lose between “$233 billion and $521 billion annually to fraud.”
“The waste and fraud in entitlement spending, which is most of the federal spending, is entitlements, so that’s the big one to eliminate,” he said.
A Trump adviser acknowledged that they were aware of “outside concern” around Musk’s comments. Trump allies — including some on Wall Street, in corporate America and Congress — have conveyed to the White House and even the president directly that Musk either has to be taken off air or needs to be more scripted.
A White House official who, like others in this article, requested anonymity to speak candidly, said they were sympathetic to the views of some Republicans who see Musk’s comments on Social Security as potentially problematic and worrying to some senior citizens.
“Of course they don’t want their Social Security cut,” the person said. “So if they hear something on the news that Elon Musk is saying, that we should do something with Social Security — of course there might be some concerns. But the only concern they have to worry about is what the president of the United States is saying and what he’s doing. We haven’t touched Social Security. We’re not going to touch Social Security.”
The White House official said Musk’s personal opinions about Social Security have no impact on Trump’s policies.
“At the end of the day, President Trump has full trust in Elon Musk’s decisions,” the official said. “The reality is everything that Elon is doing when it comes to Social Security is just to improve it.”
“Any American receiving Social Security benefits will continue to receive them,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said. “The sole mission of DOGE is to identify waste, fraud, and abuse only … DOGE has already identified billions of dollars in savings for American taxpayers, and President Trump will continue to direct this effort until our government is truly for the people, and by the people.”
A Republican lawmaker who was not familiar with the calls to the White House said Musk’s disparagement of Social Security has unnerved people nevertheless.
“It does need to be reformed,” the lawmaker said. “Without reforming Social Security and Medicare, both programs will collapse and take the government down with it. But the last thing we need to talk about is disparaging the system. It’s not a Ponzi scheme, it’s just an entitlement program that needs to be reformed.”
“The more of these Musk interviews, the more discussion we’ll have. I think the entire 2026 campaign will be a referendum on Musk” if the billionaire’s poll numbers continue to drop, this person added. “You will see ad after ad with the chainsaw.”
Musk and his U.S. DOGE Service have taken a chain saw to plenty in the federal government, including the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Department of Education. But Social Security is a tougher target.
Long known as the “third rail” of American politics, the popular retirement and disability program has now been hit by Musk’s downsizing effort as DOGE closes some Social Security offices and curtails telephone services — moves that even Republicans are beginning to push back on. Meanwhile, Democrats are salivating as Musk opens a new political front that pops in their own polling.
“Social Security is the most successful government program in American history,” said Rep. Brendan Boyle, D-Pa., the top Democrat on the Budget Committee. “It’s an earned benefit that people paid into over their entire lives. If Elon and Trump go after it, I promise you this will be their undoing.”
The Democratic firm Blueprint tested 20 different political messages about Musk, and the four that were most “concerning” to registered voters were all about Social Security. The top two were about Musk’s proposals to fire Social Security Administration employees and dismantle phone services. By contrast, voters said the messages least concerning to them were about his personal life, such as Musk fathering children with five different women. The survey was conducted last week and released Thursday.
Policy experts close to the White House said despite Musk’s rhetoric and proximity to the president, Trump remains sensitive to the political risk of touching Social Security. He’s been so unequivocal about maintaining benefits that even administration officials who would like to retool or cut the program are not challenging his edict.
“Even beyond the president, the White House itself has made crystal clear that they’re not touching Social Security,” one former Trump White House official said.
Another former top Trump aide also said given Musk’s prominent role in the administration, the administration needs to consistently remind voters of Trump’s own promise not to cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid benefits and that Musk’s opinions are not the official policies of the Trump administration.
But the former official said Trump may be more amenable to tweaks that can be sold as eliminating waste, fraud and abuse — a sentiment the president hinted at in falsely asserting to a joint session of Congress that millions of dead people are receiving Social Security checks. That assertion came after Musk promoted similar misinformation online. The billionaire White House adviser has also claimed hundreds of billions of dollars in Social Security payments are being funneled to undocumented immigrants — framing that could appeal to Trump.
Musk’s promise to cut between $1 trillion and $2 trillion in federal spending is virtually impossible without touching entitlement spending. And while Trump insists he wants to root out fraud, that’s unlikely to dent the program’s spending. The Social Security inspector general found that improper payments from fiscal year 2015 to 2022 totaled less than 1% of benefits paid over that time — and most of those were overpayments.
The rhetoric has been matched with policy shifts at the agency — even though Trump’s pick to serve as commissioner has yet to be confirmed. Leland Dudek, the acting commissioner, recently outlined his vision in a lengthy memo to staff members, talking up exploratory efforts to incorporate artificial intelligence into its phone services and enhance its anti-fraud efforts.
The agency is also moving forward with a plan to no longer allow beneficiaries to change their bank information over the phone, necessitating a visit to the office or the creation of an online account — which Social Security employees told NBC News would make it more difficult for some elderly recipients to maintain their benefits.
Already, Dudek and the Social Security Administration have had to backtrack on a couple of unpopular decisions after public outcry.
The agency scrapped plans to end phone service for filing disability and retirement claims entirely, The Washington Post reported. Dudek also rescinded and apologized for an order that would have no longer allowed parents in Maine to sign up for their newborns’ Social Security numbers at hospitals, instead having them register at federal offices.
The one-two punch of office closures and new limits on phone service have drawn concerns across the political spectrum. On Thursday, Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., described the choice to close a Social Security hearing office in his district as “a slap in the face to thousands of my constituents who rely on these services.”
“This office handles over 2,000 backlogged cases and conducts hundreds of in-person hearings every year,” Lawler, who represents a swing district, added in a statement. He said it was “completely unacceptable” to tell his constituents that they need to travel farther to receive the same service.
Other Republicans are publicly warning Musk and DOGE to tread lightly when slashing Social Security employees, as that carries negative impacts for seniors.
“First, we are not going to cut Social Security benefits. Secondly, we need to be so cautious [about] how we cut the workforce because customer service is inadequate now as it is,” Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., who represents an Omaha-based swing district and is a perennial Democratic target, told NBC News. “Our goal needs to be improving the customer service. I know this firsthand. We had a death on our family and it has been hard to get someone to stop the payments.”
Yet amid those concerns, Republicans said they did not remember Social Security being a subject of conversation in private meetings with Musk. Sen. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., said he did not recall Musk bringing up Social Security with senators during the billionaire’s closed-door meeting with them last month. A senior Senate GOP aide echoed Cramer, saying he did not think Musk “has really addressed Social Security much with senators at all.”
Social Security employees who spoke with NBC News, meanwhile, said Musk’s entitlement rhetoric and the administration’s recent moves have them increasingly concerned the administration will move to privatize Social Security.
“The stuff that [Musk is] saying is untrue, and he must know that what he’s saying is untrue, but he’s saying it to move the needle and turn public sentiment against Social Security so that privatization or vastly downsizing the workforce will seem like a good idea,” said one employee at the agency, who requested anonymity out of fear of reprisal.
A second Social Security employee said wait times are increasing for services, and employees are telling people to try and get any bank information changes in as soon as possible.
This person noted that elderly Social Security recipients who might not be tech-savvy and live far from a Social Security office are going to be most affected by the changes.
“It’s going to prevent people from getting their benefits,” this person said, adding that the effort amounts to “a very stealthy, very covert hostile takeover.”
Nancy Altman, the president of the advocacy group Social Security Works, argued that the Trump-Musk moves to slash and overhaul the Social Security Administration can do grave harm to benefits — even if Congress doesn’t act to change the program.
“What I see happening is that Donald Trump gets the politics, which is why he flooded the swing states with flyers saying he wouldn’t cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid,” Altman said. “So what is happening is an effort to undermine Social Security from within — with the idea that the benefits could be disrupted. It’s with the endgame, certainly, of outsourcing and privatizing the administration of it.”
Altman said giving Musk’s “DOGE teenagers and 20-year-olds in control of the Social Security Administration” access to seniors’ personal data creates data safety concerns that leave the program vulnerable to hackers and scammers — “a con artist’s dream,” she said. She argued that new rules requiring in-person office visits to register could mean that seniors who are disabled or immobile don’t end up getting benefits. And she warned that the removal of Social Security Administration workers will lead to weaker customer service and longer wait times for benefits.
At a time of division for Democrats, the battle to prevent Trump and Musk from shrinking the Social Security Administration is a unifying force.
At a press conference Tuesday in Brooklyn, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., faced questions about his disagreements with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., on the GOP funding bill, but he said they’re united on protecting Social Security.
“We all align on the fights that are in front of us on behalf of the people that we represent here in Brooklyn and New York City and across the country,” Jeffries told reporters. “And that’s saving Medicaid, saving Social Security, saving Medicare — all of which Elon Musk and Donald Trump and the Republicans, they want to take a chain saw to Medicaid. They want to take a chain saw to Social Security.”
First-term Rep. Janelle Bynum, D-Ore., who flipped a competitive district last fall, said she’s hearing from constituents who are anxious about Social Security changes, office closures and potential impacts to their benefits due to Musk’s actions.
“Maybe it’s good for billionaires like him, but it isn’t good for my constituents,” Bynum said. “And we have an unelected billionaire trying to cut what we know is an essential program for millions of Americans.”
