Challenges and Controversies in Social Security

As the Trump administration seeks to escalate its immigration crackdown, the government has turned to a concerning source of information for data on immigrants: the Social Security Administration. Reports indicate that Elon Musk’s DOGE initiative and the Department of Homeland Security successfully pushed Social Security officials to provide access to what’s commonly known as the “Death Master File,” allowing the government to mark living immigrants as dead in the Social Security Administration’s systems. The goal, according to press reports, is to make the lives of these individuals so difficult that they choose to leave the country. 

What exactly is the Death Master File, and why is this strategy so alarming? To understand, Lawfare Senior Editor Quinta Jurecic spoke to Kathleen Romig, Director of Social Security and Disability Policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and Devin O’Connor, a senior fellow at the center. They explained the unsettling implications of tinkering with the Death Master File and situated these efforts within the broader scope of the Trump administration—and DOGE’s—repeated attacks on Social Security.

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