North Liberty, Iowa — At the weekly senior lunch social in North Liberty, Iowa, chicken was on the menu, but Social Security was top of mind.
Iowa, like the U.S., is aging. One in four people in the state is age 60 and older, according to the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services. Uncertainty in Washington means anxiety here.
Anne Bacon tells CBS News the issue gives her “daymares.”
Bacon relies on the $1,600 a month she receives from Social Security to pay for the 24-hour care of her brother, Rick Clark, who has dementia.
“Every day I’m worried that somehow he’ll lose his care,” Bacon said.
When a Social Security check didn’t arrive in January, Bacon called the agency and ended up on hold for more than six hours on two separate calls. When she finally got someone on the phone, the problem was resolved in minutes.
The average wait time for Social Security calls has doubled in the last six months to 104 minutes.
John Hale worked for Social Security for 25 years. He and his wife Terri are now advocates for older and disabled Iowans through the Hale Group.
“It’s about retirement benefits,” Hale said. “It’s about survivors’ benefits, and about payments to people with disabilities.”
President Trump has insisted that he is not touching Social Security, which has more than 70 million recipients. But he is touching jobs within the agency. Last month, the agency announced plans to cut about 7,000 employees, or about 12% of its workforce.
The agency has also been hit by a bevy of changes. The Social Security Administration announced earlier this month that it would require in-person identity checks for new and existing beneficiaries, with some limited exemptions. Following backlash to the move, this week it said it was delaying implementation of the policy until April 14.
Also this month, the SSA said that recipients would no longer be able to change direct deposit and other banking information with the agency by phone, claiming that it could lead to fraud. Recipients will instead be required to use the SSA’s online platform or visit a local SSA office.
The moves come as Frank Bisignano, President Trump’s nominee to run the SSA, faced questions during his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday about the potential role of the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, in the SSA. DOGE is being run by billionaire Elon Musk.
“One of the things that concerns us, and I think concerns those people, is there’s a bunch of billionaires who are making decisions about this service who will never need Social Security,” Terri Hale said. “They’ll never have a family member who needs Social Security. They are out of touch with the real world.”
Kate Gibson,
Megan Cerullo and
Aimee Picchi
contributed to this report.
