In Debate With Trump, Harris Must Seize the Narrative on Social Security

Donald Trump loves to spew misinformation and outright lies about Social Security. If he is left unchallenged, he’ll do just that at this week’s debate. Fortunately, Vice President Kamala Harris can counter those lies with the truth about our Social Security system — and the Democratic Party’s commitment to protecting and expanding benefits.

Harris is a longtime Social Security champion. As a Senator, she co-sponsored the Social Security Expansion Act. This legislation would raise benefits by $200 a month and keep Social Security strong for the next 75 years and beyond. It is fully paid for by requiring the wealthiest Americans, who currently stop paying into Social Security after their first $168,600 of earnings, to contribute their fair share.

Harris has not wavered from this commitment. This August, on Social Security’s 89th birthday, she tweeted “For 89 years, Social Security has made the difference between poverty or peace of mind for millions of seniors, people with disabilities, and other beneficiaries. Donald Trump is a threat to these bedrock programs. As President, I will protect and expand them.”

Accordingly, the 2024 Democratic platform states that “We reject any effort to privatize Social Security or to cut any of the benefits that the American people have earned. Middle-class Americans pay 6.2 percent of their income to support Social Security, and the self-employed pay twice that. But people with multi-million dollar incomes pay a fraction of 1 percent. We'll strengthen the program and expand benefits by asking the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share.”

Earlier this week, the Harris campaign released their official policy agenda, A New Way Forward, which states that “Vice President Harris will protect Social Security and Medicare against relentless attacks from Donald Trump and his extreme allies. She will strengthen Social Security and Medicare for the long haul by making millionaires and billionaires pay their fair share in taxes. She will always fight to ensure that Americans can count on getting the benefits they earned.”

Those who support Social Security must vote for Democrats who want to expand, not cut, it. But they must know where the two parties stand.

The Harris plan for Social Security is extremely popular across party lines. Eighty-three percent of Democrats, 73% of independents, and 73% of Republicans want to expand Social Security and pay for it by making the wealthy contribute their fair share. But for Harris to benefit from this popularity, voters need to know about her plan.

The upcoming debate is the perfect opportunity for Harris to counter Trump’s lies on Social Security, and seize control of the narrative. Trump has long understood the political potency of Social Security. In 2015, he claimed that “I’m not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican.” This was a lie. As President, every single one of his budgets proposed cuts to Social Security, as well as Medicare.

Now, Trump is doubling down on the misinformation by demagoguing about immigrants. His campaign is blanketing the airwaves in Pennsylvania and other swing states with ads and mailings saying that undocumented immigrants, aided by Kamala Harris, are getting Social Security benefits. That is a lie.

The truth is exactly the opposite: Undocumented immigrants don’t receive even a penny of Social Security benefits, even though they contribute billions into the system every year. Even if they later become documented and can prove that those are their contributions, they are barred from receiving even a penny of those earned benefits. And like all American workers, documented workers only receive benefits if they have contributed for the requisite number of quarters – forty quarters for retirement benefits.

Immigration makes Social Security more affordable, adding millions of workers who contribute to Social Security with every paycheck. As the Chief Actuary of Social Security has explained, “Because immigrants into the U.S. are generally young, they increase the ratio of working age population to retirement age population in much the same way as do births.” And unlike the JD Vance plan for growing the workforce, it doesn’t involve forcing women to carry unwanted and life-threatening pregnancies to term.

Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the man who proposed and signed Social Security into law, famously said, when Republicans sought political support to repeal this landmark achievement, that “It is an old strategy of tyrants to delude their victims into fighting their battles for them.” That’s exactly what Trump is trying to do with his lies about immigrants. He wants to divide and distract the American people so that they aren’t focused on the real threat to Social Security: Billionaires who will do anything to avoid paying their fair share into the system.

Trump also has another talking point on Social Security: He claims he will eliminate taxation of benefits. This is politically astute, but when you scratch the surface, it is not what it seems. Those taxes are part of Social Security’s dedicated revenue. The proceeds go into the Social Security trust funds, and Trump has no plan to replace them. The problem is that Social Security needs more dedicated revenue, not less. Social Security’s trustees are projecting that, if Congress does not act, Social Security’s modest but vital benefits will be cut automatically by a staggering 17 percent in about a decade.

Trump and his fellow Republicans have made clear that not only do they not want to raise taxes on the super-rich, they want to throw more tax breaks at them. Consequently, Trump’s proposal to cut taxes on Social Security benefits is a cynical mirage. It would simply bring about the projected automatic cuts sooner. Like his other lies, it would not provide what he claims. It would lead to lower benefits, when the smoke cleared, not higher benefits.

Importantly, Democrats are also proposing relief from the taxation of benefits, along with a number of other expansions. In sharp contrast to Trump’s plan, the Democratic plan is fully funded — by requiring those with annual incomes over $400,000 to pay their fair share.

The difference between the Democratic and Republican positions couldn’t be clearer. Democrats want to eliminate Social Security’s projected shortfall and expand benefits, all paid for by requiring the uber-wealthy to pay their fair share. Republicans want to cut Social Security, either through a closed-door process or automatic cuts, both of which avoid political accountability, and they want to give even more tax handouts to their uber-wealthy donors.

Those who support Social Security must vote for Democrats who want to expand, not cut, it. But they must know where the two parties stand. The upcoming debate provides Vice President Harris the perfect opportunity to draw the distinction. Whether specifically asked a question about Social Security or not, she should make sure those watching know the truth.