MARCH 26, 2025|
Photo – Senator John Barrasso – Bigfoot99 file photo
In Washington, D.C., Wyoming Senator John Barrasso said President Donald Trump’s pick to head the Social Security Administration, Frank Bisigano, is the right person for the job.
Associated Press reporter Fatima Hussein, yesterday, discounted Trump’s pick to head up Social Security “as a self-professed ‘DOGE person.’”
Democrats appeared frustrated at times on Tuesday. During the two and one half-hour hearing before the Senate Finance Committee, Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts painted a scenario of a person with limited internet access and mobility issues being turned away from an understaffed Social Security office. She ended with a question for Bisignano: “Isn’t that a benefit cut?”
Bisignano’s response was simple. “I have no intent to have anything like that happening under my watch,” the nominee said.
Wyoming’s senior senator took a decidedly different opinion, calling Bisigano—an executive with extensive experience in the financial industry, “the right person for the job.”
Audio PlayerSenator Barrasso also took a critical tone, saying the Social Security Administration needs to improve customer service by cutting wait-times and backlogs. The Wyoming Senator also said “improper payments” is another issue that hurts Washington.
The Senator also questioned how news, about social security and how the agency operates, is sometimes distorted by “fake news”, incorrect information that takes on a life of its own.
Audio PlayerRepublicans appear largely in favor of Bisignano’s nomination. One Democrat, Senator Tina Smith of Montana, declined to ask any questions of the nominee, describing the situation as “a travesty” and a “wholesale effort to dismantle social security.”
Changes are no doubt needed. The Social Security program faces a looming bankruptcy date that Congress must address. The May 2024 trustees’ report states that Social Security’s trust funds will be unable to pay full benefits a decade from now, beginning in 2035. Then, Social Security would only be able to pay 83% of benefits, absent changes.
