During Wednesday’s hearing focused on President Biden’s fiscal 2024 budget proposal Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) questioned Shalanda Young, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) on Social Security.
Romney started his line of questions with a relatively controversial question as he asked whether she knew of any current senator or congressman that was promoting Social Security to be cut or have some of its benefits cut.
In response, Young began to say that there have been some who have held that position. She then continued to say “Have they changed their position? Maybe, but yes. Members who are current—” before being cut off by Romney who specified that he was inquiring about the “last several months or the last year.”
In response Young once again stated that there were members of Congress who had “well-known policies” seeking to cut Social Security and Medicare. However, Romney dismissed those claims and called them “simply wrong” twice. Romney then inquired about whether Young was aware that the program’s funds were expected to “run out” within the next decade, which would reduce the benefits by around 25 percent.
Specifically, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report from last month showed that the funds for Social Security are expected to shortfall in 2032, which is slightly sooner than originally anticipated.
CBO Director Phillip Swagel stated that benefits” would be more than 20 percent smaller than scheduled.” In response, Young stated that she was aware of the funding problem.
However, when asked about how Biden’s budget would fix it she was cut off from replying as she started talking about the congress members who wanted to cut these programs.
