Elon Musk’s recent social media posts leave little doubt: He has been thinking about Social Security a lot lately. In fact, Donald Trump’s biggest campaign donor and the head of the quasi-governmental DOGE operation keeps tweeting bizarre claims about alleged fraud and “inconsistencies” he thinks he has identified in the Social Security system.
Those claims have invariably collapsed under scrutiny. Indeed, it has become rather embarrassing lately. Musk claimed, for example, that millions of people over the age of 130 were receiving Social Security checks — he said it was perhaps “the biggest fraud in the history of humanity” — but none of this was true.
It’s possible that the billionaire GOP megadonor just doesn’t know enough about government programs to understand how wrong he is. It’s also possible that Musk is indifferent to the facts and is engaged in a misinformation campaign. Either way, there’s no reason for the public to take his claims at face value, since they keep getting debunked.
It’s against this backdrop that many of the nation’s most powerful Republicans, including Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson, continue to peddle Musk’s claims about Social Security as if they were true. They are not.
But the problem is not limited to Musk’s falsehoods. After all, the fact that he’s plainly wrong might not be consequential at all: Musk claims to have found “fraud”; reality proves otherwise; and we all move on with our lives. Right?
Well, maybe not. Making matters worse is the apparent fact that the donor helping run the executive branch in 2025 has a problem with the Social Security system itself. USA Today reported:
Elon Musk sharply criticized Social Security in a Friday podcast interview with Joe Rogan, labeling the critical elder benefits program a “Ponzi scheme.” Musk, who is the world’s richest man and an increasingly powerful adviser to President Donald Trump, also described the federal government as “one big pyramid scheme.” Musk is a leading figure in the administration’s effort — largely through the Department of Government Efficiency — to cut costs and dismantle the federal bureaucracy.
And it’s at this point where the offensive becomes tougher to shrug off.
Indeed, let’s take stock. Trump has put his top campaign donor in a position of enormous authority, despite Musk’s unfamiliarity with basics of governing. This same donor regularly peddles falsehoods about Social Security, keeps suggesting there are people receiving benefits checks that shouldn’t exist, is helping advance thousands of layoffs at the Social Security administration and, in case that weren’t quite enough, is condemning the structure of the popular social insurance program.
It’d be tough to blame someone who relies on Social Security for feeling a bit nervous right about now. “You don’t need to scratch your head and wonder what’s going on when you see that the Trump administration is decimating Social Security offices and staff,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement. “And you don’t need to ponder what might happen next when Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, says that the tens-of-millions of seniors, families, and children who depend on these earned benefits are part of some scam — because that’s a real threat and a real promise: they are coming for your Social Security.” The New York Democrat added, “The richest man in the world and his sidekick, the President of the United States, have decided to attack the bedrock of America’s social safety net, and now your pocket is in the way.” This post updates our related earlier coverage.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
Latest Post
Recommended
