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| Government Corruption | |
| CNN anchor surprised when former Social Security official laughs off questions about fraud | |
| 2025-02-19 | |
| [FoxNews] Martin O'Malley mocked Elon Musk claiming millions of people in the Social Security database are listed as over 100 years old Former Social Security commissioner Martin O’Malley considered the suggestion that the agency is "rife with fraud" laughable on "CNN News Central" Tuesday. O’Malley, who served as the Social Security Administration (SSA) commissioner under President Biden from 2023 to 2024, discussed the report that the acting SSA head Michelle King had quit her job after clashing with Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) over access to data. "Elon Musk has claimed that SSA is rife with fraud, suggesting that benefits are being paid to dead people, that millions and millions of dollars are going to waste," CNN host Boris Sanchez said. O’Malley began laughing at the accusation.
"Yeah," O’Malley answered, still laughing. "He has no idea what he's talking about. There is not like a zombie apocalypse of people, you know, cadavers running around with Social Security checks coming out of their pockets." He then admitted that "it’s a big agency," so there are "outliers." "It‘s 72.5 million people. Sometimes really desperate people will try to hide the fact that grandma died, so they get a couple more checks," O’Malley said. He added, "More often, because of the checks we have in place where we interrupt payments of people over a certain age, especially if they stop receiving Medicare benefits… more usual is that we have to restore benefits when we erroneously cut them off, when somebody moves out of the country or something." O’Malley criticized Musk for putting out claims that he "can never back up." "Ask Elon Musk, show me the 12 people that are 150 years old. He can’t. Show me the 200 million that are still receiving checks. He can’t. These 19-year-old nitwits from DOGE that are violating the law and plucking people’s personal identifying information, they don’t know what they’re looking at," O’Malley said. Musk has claimed that more than 20 million names listed in the Social Security database were over 100 years old, including more than 3.9 million in the 130-139 age range, more than 3.5 million in the 140-149 range and more than 1.3 million in the 150-159 range. He did not say how many were still receiving benefits. Related: Martin O’Malley 02/04/2025 DNC Chair Candidate Reveals Massive Donations from George Soros, Reid Hoffman on Eve of Vote Martin O’Malley 01/16/2025 Stay-at-Home Bureaucrats: Congressional probe exposes billions in waste from federal telework gigs Martin O’Malley 01/07/2020 Lincoln Chafee Launching Longshot White House Bid as Libertarian | |
| Posted by:Skidmark |
| #12 I'm not sure O'Malley addressed the question at all. he just mocked the auditor. |
| Posted by: Bobby 2025-02-19 18:53 |
| #11 Even CNN anchors understand the line item deduction from their paycheck for 'Social Security'. I've heard the DOGE Team called many nasty things, but "nit-wits" isn't one of them. Bold move. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2025-02-19 17:52 |
| #10 a 2023 report from the IG of the SSAdmin estimated about $71B in improper payments over, I think, a ten year period of course this was an estimate SSA began a claw back but only expects to recoup about $200M by 2026 There is probably far more fraud in the Medicaid program, especially since the Obamacare legislation. That will be a struggle to investigate as a lot of it involves a combination of upcoding, overdiagnosis and other measures. |
| Posted by: Lord Garth 2025-02-19 16:55 |
| #9 Laughing all the way to the overseas crypto account, methinks. |
| Posted by: Regular joe 2025-02-19 14:51 |
| #8 The DC Swamp is running for the Hills. |
| Posted by: NN2N1 2025-02-19 14:37 |
| #7 There is not like a zombie apocalypse of people, you know, cadavers running around with Social Security checks coming out of their pockets. That, right there, has me convinced. What pill popping retard thought that deflection line was a good idea? |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2025-02-19 13:48 |
| #6 So it was screwed up, they knew it was screwed up, and didn't do anything. Because that would involve actually doing their jobs. |
| Posted by: ed in texas 2025-02-19 12:28 |
| #5 ...just not them. Google, insurance companies, the Chinese.... |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2025-02-19 07:37 |
#4 plucking people’s personal identifying information As if the feds don't already have all that on virtually everyone in the USA. |
| Posted by: q 2025-02-19 05:23 |
| #3 Damn the typos, full speed ahead. I need coffee. |
| Posted by: Whiskey Mike 2025-02-19 03:55 |
| #2 This guy needs to be pre-emptively jailed. Its attitudes like his that are the root of corruption. Stunning arrogance, but I suspect this attitude IS the swamp. |
| Posted by: Whiskey Mike 2025-02-19 03:54 |
| #1 The lady doth protest too much, methinks. |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2025-02-19 00:36 |