Mike Franken's Chances of Beating Chuck Grassley for Senate in Iowa: Polls

BY JASON LEMON 

ON 7/17/22 

Democrat Mike Franken aims to defeat GOP Senator Chuck Grassley in Iowa in the upcoming November midterms, hoping to flip a Republican-held seat blue to help his political party retain, or possibly shore up, their slim majority in the Senate—but recent polls show he's facing an uphill battle.

Grassley, 88, has held his Senate seat since 1981 and is one of the oldest elected members of the legislative body. Franken is a retired Navy vice admiral and former Defense Department official. The Democrat previously ran unsuccessfully for his party's nomination to run against GOP Senator Joni Ernst in 2020. He won the June primary this year, however, with just over 55 percent of the vote.

In a conservative leaning state that went for former President Donald Trump in 2016 and in 2020, with two Republican senators and a GOP governor, Franken has a difficult race ahead. Recent polls show the Democratic candidate trailing the Republican incumbent.

Senator Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, is the clear frontrunner in his reelection campaign against Democratic challenger Mike Franken, according to recent polls. Above to the left, Franken speaks at a primary election-night event on June 7 in Des Moines, Iowa. Above to the right, Grassley speaks at a hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee on July 12 in Washington, D.C.

STEPHEN MATUREN/ANNA MONEYMAKER/GETTY IMAGES

New polling published by Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa Poll on Saturday had Grassley just 8 points ahead of Franken. The incumbent GOP senator was backed by 47 percent of likely Iowa voters compared to 39 percent who supported his Democratic challenger.

While the Republican has a substantial lead, the new poll results were the worst for Grassley in more than three decades.

"While Grassley leads Franken, the margin is narrower than in any Iowa Poll matchup involving Grassley since he was first elected to the U.S. Senate. Grassley has not polled below 50% in a head-to-head contest since October 1980, before he went on to defeat incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. John Culver," Des Moines Register reported.

The survey included 597 likely Iowan voters and had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points. It was carried out from July 10 to 13 by Selzer & Co.

A previous poll conducted from June 30 to July 4 for Franken's campaign by Change Research showed a closer race, although Grassley was still in the lead. The survey results had the Republican senator at 49 percent while the retired Navy officer came in at 44 percent. That was a lead of 5 points for the incumbent.

The poll included 1,488 likely voters and had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.7 percent.

In April, a similar Change Research poll for Franken's campaign showed the Democrat down by 3 points. Grassley was backed by 45 percent of likely voters and the Democratic candidate had the support of 42 percent. Some 1,070 respondents were included in the survey with a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percent.

Although Grassley is clearly the frontrunner in the Senate race, Franken appears to be performing well for a Democratic challenger to the GOP incumbent. In every reelection campaign since 1986, Grassley has beat his liberal challengers by large double-digit margins.

No Democrat has managed to win even 40 percent of the vote against him. Whether Franken ultimately manages to do so, or potentially even pull off an upset victory, remains to be seen.

"It's a solid lead [for Grassley]," pollster J. Ann Selzer told Des Moines Register. "But it's just not as huge as we've seen in the past."

'Seemingly invincible' Chuck Grassley is in his tightest ever re-election battle in Iowa

Bob Brigham
October 15, 2022

Chuck Grassley / Gage Skidmore
HE WAS MADE FOR TERM LIMITS

Republican Chuck Grassley has been an Iowa lawmaker since 1959, but appears to be in a tight battle for political survival as he seeks his eighth term in the U.S. Senate.

On Saturday night, the Des Moines Register released it's latest Mediacom Iowa Poll, showing Grassley only leading retired Admiral Mike Franken by three points, 46% to 43%.

The poll, conducted by pollster J. Ann Selzer, has often been called the gold standard of Iowa polling.

Selzer told the newspaper the poll "says to me that Franken is running a competent campaign and has a shot to defeat the seemingly invincible Chuck Grassley — previously perceived to be invincible."

The poll shows Democrats may have a chance to flip a seat in a largely overlooked seat.

"Election analysts for months have rated the race in Grassley’s favor, and national Democratic groups have indicated they don’t plan to spend money supporting Franken, instead focusing on states where they see greater potential for victory," the newspaper reported. "But the poll indicates weaknesses for Grassley beyond his head-to-head race with Franken. His job disapproval rating is a record high for him in the Iowa Poll. The percentage of Iowans who view him unfavorably also hit a peak. And nearly two-thirds of likely voters say the senator’s age is a concern rather than an asset."

Grassley, 89, was first elected to the Iowa House of Representatives in the 1958 midterm elections. He served eight terms in the legislature, then three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, before first being elected to the U.S. Senate when he shared the ballot with Ronald Reagan in 1980.

Nate Silver of 538 wrote, "The reason this is interesting is not because Grassley is going to lose (probably not) and not even because the Selzer poll has been accurate (though it has been) but because she's a pollster who will publish what her numbers tell her and not herd toward the conventional wisdom."

Also on Saturday, Grassley posted a video explaining how much corn farming has changed during his time as a farmer.

Watch below or at this link:

GRASSLEY GOT IOWA ON THE BIOFUEL TAX CREDIT KICK WAAAAAAY BACK IN 1984

UNDER RONALD REAGAN

NIGHT OF THE LONG KNIVES

Trump Tries To Fire Inspectors General, Likely Violating Federal Law

Eric Boehm
Sat, January 25, 2025


President Donald Trump reportedly tried to fire at least a dozen inspectors general on Friday night, but that action appears to violate a law that Congress recently passed to prevent such a purge.

Reports vary on how many federal inspectors general were handed pink slips. The New York Times reports that "at least 12" of the executive branch agency watchdogs were dismissed by the president on Friday night, while The Washington Post pegs the number at 15 and ABC says at least 17 were canned.

Many of those fired were Trump appointees from his first term in office, the Post noted. It remains unclear whether the administration plans to fill the positions with newly appointed loyalists or to leave the posts vacant.

The firings will likely trigger an immediate legal battle over the president's authority to send inspectors general packing. A law passed by Congress in 2008 requires the White House to provide 30 days' notice before removing or replacing an inspector general. An updated version of that law, passed in 2022, requires that a president provide Congress with "substantive rationale, including detailed and case-specific reasons" for the removal. (That change was motivated, in part, by Trump's decision in 2020 to abruptly remove an inspector general charged with oversight of pandemic-era stimulus spending.)

In a letter to the White House after the firings, Hannibal "Mike" Ware, chairman of the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency wrote: "At this point, we do not believe the actions taken are legally sufficient to dismiss" the officials.

The Trump administration did not provide notice to Congress and has not informed lawmakers about the rationale for the firing, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R–Iowa), told CNN's Manu Raju on Saturday. "There may be good reason the IGs were fired," Grassley said. "We need to know that if so. I'd like further explanation from President Trump."

"These dismissals clearly violate federal law," Sen. Dick Durbin (D–Ill.), the highest-ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, declared in a statement. Durbin called the move "a brazen attempt to rig these offices to look the other way when violations of law take place."

Some of the officials Trump tried to fire are unwilling to go without a fight. "At least one of the fired inspectors general—the State Department's Cardell Richardson Sr.—has told staff he plans to show up to work on Monday," Politico reported.

This mass dismissal comes on the heels of Trump's move earlier this week to dismiss several members from a White House board that provides oversight on privacy and civil liberties issues, including the federal government's warrantless spying programs.
So far, the second Trump administration seems less interested in draining the swamp than in pushing aside people who might sound the alarm about corruption, illegal actions, and other abuses of executive power.

Trump's firing of independent watchdog officials draws criticism

By Nandita Bose and Ismail Shakil
Sat, January 25, 2025 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump's late-night firing of inspectors general at multiple government agencies was criticized as illegal on Saturday by Democrats and others and drew concern from at least one fellow Republican.

In what critics called a late-night purge, Trump fired 17 independent watchdogs on Friday, a person with knowledge of the matter told Reuters, a move that clears the way to replace independent watchdogs with loyalists.

U.S. Senator Adam Schiff, a longtime Democratic antagonist of Trump, said the action was a clear violation of the law.


"Trump wants no accountability for malfeasance in office," Schiff said in a post on platform X. "He is refilling the swamp."

Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump defended the move saying "it’s a very common thing to do." He did not say who would be installed in the vacant posts.

The inspectors general at agencies including the departments of State, Defense and Transportation were notified by emails from the White House personnel director that they had been terminated immediately, the source told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

The dismissals, handed out less than a week after Trump took office for his second term, appeared to violate federal law, the independent Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency said in a letter to the White House on Friday.

The law requires a president to give Congress "substantive rationale, including detailed and case specific reasons" for the dismissals 30 days in advance, the council said in the letter to Sergio Gor, White House personnel director.

Gor's Friday email to the fired inspectors cited "changing priorities" as a reason for the firings, according to the letter, reported by Politico.

"At this point, we do not believe the actions taken are legally sufficient to dismiss Presidentially Appointed, Senate Confirmed Inspectors General," said Council Chair Hannibal Ware, suggesting Gor consult with the White House counsel.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Michael Bromwich, a former Justice Department inspector general, said the firings were "plainly illegal."

An inspector general is an independent position that conducts audits and investigations into allegations of waste, fraud and abuse of power.

Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, a longtime supporter of inspectors general, said he wanted to know why Trump fired the watchdogs.

"There may be good reason the IGs were fired. We need to know that if so. I'd like further explanation from President Trump," Grassley said in a statement, adding that a detailed 30-day notice of removal was not provided to Congress.

Fellow Republican Senator John Barrasso said he believes Trump will make wise decisions on the inspectors general. "Some of them deserve to be fired," he told Fox News.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer called the firings "a chilling purge" and a preview of a "lawless approach" by the Trump administration.

Agencies are pressing ahead with orders from Trump, who returned to the presidency on Jan. 20, to reshape the federal bureaucracy by scrapping diversity programs, rescinding job offers and sidelining more than 150 national security and foreign policy officials.

Friday's dismissals spared the Department of Justice inspector general, Michael Horowitz, according to the New York Times. The Washington Post, which was first to report the dismissals, said most were appointees from Trump's 2017-2021 first term.

A source familiar with the issue who spoke on condition of anonymity said among the inspectors general whom Trump has fired is John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction. He was terminated on Friday evening even though his operation is due to close in September, said the source.

Many politically appointed leaders of agencies and departments come and go with each administration, but an inspector general can serve under multiple presidents.

During his first term, Trump fired five inspectors general in a two-month period in 2020. This included the State Department inspector general, who had played a role in the president's impeachment proceedings.

Last year, Trump's predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden, fired the inspector general of the U.S. Railroad Retirement Board, after an investigation found the official had created a hostile work environment.

In 2022, Congress strengthened protections for inspectors general, making it harder to replace them with hand-picked officials and requiring additional explanations from a president for their removal.

(Reporting by Nadita Bose in Washington, Chandni Shah in Bengaluru, Ismail Shakil in Ottawa Jonathan Landay in Washington and Nate Raymond in Boston; Writing by Doina Chiacu; Editing by William Mallard, Matthew Lewis and Chizu Nomiyama)


Sen. Adam Schiff says Trump 'broke the law' by firing 18 inspectors general

Alexandra Marquez
Sun, January 26, 2025 

Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., on Sunday blasted President Donald Trump for his decision to fire 18 inspectors general late Friday night and accused the president of breaking the law.

“To write off this clear violation of law by saying, ‘Well,’ that ‘technically, he broke law.’ Yeah, he broke the law,” Schiff told NBC News’ “Meet the Press.”

His comment was responding to Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who earlier in the program told “Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker that “technically, yeah,” Trump had violated the Inspector General Act, which Congress amended to strengthen protections from undue termination for inspectors general.

“I’m not, you know, losing a whole lot of sleep that he wants to change the personnel out. I just want to make sure that he gets off to a good start,” Graham added.

In a later interview on CNN, Graham defended Trump more forcefully, saying, “Yes, I think he should have done that.”

“He feels like the government hasn’t worked very well for the American people. These watchdog folks did a pretty lousy job. He wants some new eyes on Washington. And that makes sense to me,” he added.

But Schiff pushed back on that notion, warning that “if we don’t have good and independent inspector generals, we are going to see a swamp refill.”

He added, “It may be the president’s goal here ... to remove anyone that’s going to call the public attention to his malfeasance.”

Inspectors general serve in federal agencies as independent figures who audit and investigate their agencies when allegations of waste, fraud and abuse arise.

On Friday, Trump fired at least 18 inspectors general, including those in the Defense Department, State Department, Health and Human Services Department and the Department of Labor.

On Saturday, multiple lawmakers — on both sides of the aisle — pointed out that Trump’s move appeared to violate the law, which requires presidents to give Congress a 30-day notice and substantive reasoning for the firing before an inspector general is removed from their post.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, told NBC News in a statement Saturday that he’d “like further explanation from President Trump” about his justification for the firings.

“There may be good reason the IGs were fired. We need to know that if so. I’d like further explanation from President Trump. Regardless, the 30 day detailed notice of removal that the law demands was not provided to Congress,” Grassley said.

And Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., the Senate minority leader, slammed Trump’s decision in a speech on the Senate floor Saturday morning.

“Yesterday, in the dark of night, President Trump fired at least 12 independent inspector generals at important federal agencies across the administration. This is a chilling purge,” Schumer said.
He added, “These dismissals are possibly in violation of federal law, which requires Congress to have 30 days notice of any intent to fire inspectors general.”

On Saturday, a White House official told NBC News that a lot of the firing decisions happen with “legal counsel looking over them.” But they added they were checking with the White House counsel’s office, though they didn’t think the administration had broken any laws.

It’s not clear how Congress can address this apparent violation of the law, but on Sunday, Schiff said, “We have the power of the purse. We have the power right now to confirm or not confirm people for Cabinet positions that control agencies or would control agencies whose inspector generals have just been fired.”

So far, all but one of Trump’s Cabinet appointments have sailed through the Senate with the full backing of the Senate GOP caucus, which holds a 53-47 majority in that chamber. Just one nominee — new Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth — lost three GOP votes in his final confirmation vote, though he won a majority with a tie-breaking vote from Vice President JD Vance.

NBCNews.com

Even Republicans are questioning Trump’s ‘illegal’ midnight purge of inspector generals

Gustaf Kilander

THE HILL
Sun 26 January 2025 


Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) speaks with reporters on Capitol Hill on June 11, 2024. Grassley and other Republicans are now asking questions about President Donald Trump’s firing of inspectors general (Getty Images)

Some Republicans are concerned about President Donald Trump’s late-night firing Friday of more than a dozen inspectors general without giving the proper notification to Congress.

The new Trump administration fired about 17 inspectors general on Friday from a number of departments and agencies, including State, Defense and Transportation. The inspectors general are there to work against fraud, corruption and abuses of power.

Congressional Democrats were quick to slam the firings, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer saying that the action came in the “dark of night” and that it was a “chilling” indication of what the next four years would look like.

The firings could start “a golden age for abuse in government, and even corruption,” said Schumer.

On Saturday, Republicans joined in with the criticism. Iowa Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, 91, a staunch Trump ally, said in a statement obtained by CNN that Congress wasn’t notified in advance of the firings in adherence to the law.

“There may be good reason the IGs were fired,” Grassley noted Saturday. “We need to know that if so. I’d like further explanation from President Trump. Regardless, the 30-day detailed notice of removal that the law demands was not provided to Congress.”

Alaska Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski said, “What I do understand is that it is relatively unprecedented in that there was no notice.”

“I can understand why a new president coming in would want to look critically at the IGs and the role that they have played within the various agencies, but … the summary dismissal of everybody, I think, has raised concerns,” she added.

Federal law states that the White House has to inform Congress 30 days in advance of the firing of an inspector general. Several of those who lost their jobs Friday night were appointed during Trump’s first term.

On Saturday night aboard Air Force One, Trump said he “did it because it’s a very common thing to do,” adding that “not all of them” were fired.

“I don’t know them, but some people thought that some were unfair or were not doing the job. It’s a very standard thing to do,” Trump claimed without providing evidence.

On Saturday night aboard Air Force One, Trump said he “did it because it’s a very common thing to do,” adding that “not all of them” were fired (AP)

Maine Republican Senator Susan Collins noted that Trump’s firings didn’t adhere to his stated goal of fighting corruption.

“I don’t understand why one would fire individuals whose mission is to root out waste, fraud, and abuse. So this leaves a gap in what I know is a priority for President Trump,” she told reporters, according to CNN.

South Dakota Republican Senator Mike Rounds argued that Trump should get an opportunity to explain his decision.

“I honestly would just be guessing at this point as to what it what it actually entails. So I’ll wait and find out what that means in terms of other people stepping in. Are there deputies that step in? Was it specific to individuals? I just simply don’t have that information,” said Rounds.

He added: “I just heard about it just briefly this morning. I’m sure that there’ll be a discussion of it here, but I do not know what his logic was on it, and I do not know the reasoning. We’ll give him an opportunity to explain that.”

Trump fires 17 government watchdogs in middle of the night - but a key one remains in his post

Gustaf Kilander

THE INDEPENDENT UK
Sat 25 January 2025


President Donald Trump waves after stepping off Air Force One upon arrival at Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas. On Friday night, he fires several government watchdogs 

(AFP via Getty Images)

President Donald Trump fired 17 inspectors general on Friday in a late-night purge of the internal government watchdogs that monitor federal agencies.

The measure didn’t remove Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, according to The New York Times.

One of the fired officials told The Post, “It’s a widespread massacre.”

“Whoever Trump puts in now will be viewed as loyalists, and that undermines the entire system,” the official added.

The Washington Post previously reported on the firings - which are legally questionable. Trump’s critics were quick to slam the firings, with Democratic Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren saying in a social media post, “Inspectors general are charged with rooting out government waste, fraud, abuse and preventing misconduct.”

“President Trump is dismantling checks on his power and paving the way for widespread corruption,” she added.

Those working on the Trump transition had indicated that firings were likely to take place. Towards the end of his last term in office, in early 2020, Trump fired five inspectors general from their posts.

Trump was handling the coronavirus pandemic at the time even as he worked to reshape the government to remove those he viewed as trying to work against him. One of them was Michael Atkinson, the inspector general for the U.S. intelligence community, who handled the whistleblower complaint that prompted Trump’s first impeachment for pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to open an investigation into then-former Vice President Joe Biden.

Horowitz delivered a report to the Department of Justice in late 2019 regarding the FBI investigation into possible connections between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia. He found that the FBI had a basis for starting the probe, but at the same time, he criticized the warrant application to monitor Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

He added that then-FBI Director James Comey had violated department policy by writing secret memos regarding his meetings with Trump that subsequently reached the public eye. The Department of Justice chose not to prosecute Comey, to the fury of Trump, who later fired him.

The removals seemed to violate federal law, which requires Congress to be notified 30 days before the firing of any inspector general confirmed by the Senate (AP)

The firings of the inspectors open up the opportunity for Trump to install loyalists in positions that are supposed to identify fraud, waste and abuse.

The inspectors general were made aware of the firings by emails from the White House personnel director, telling them that they had been terminated immediately, people familiar with the measures told The Post.

The removals seemed to violate federal law, which requires Congress to be notified 30 days before the firing of any inspector general confirmed by the Senate.

Some of the departments and agencies affected by the firings include the departments of State, Defense, Veterans Affairs, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Interior, Energy, Commerce and Agriculture, in addition to the Environmental Protection Agency, the Small Business Administration, and the Social Security Administration, according to The Post.

Most of those who were removed were appointees by Trump from his first term in the White House. Horowitz was appointed by President Barack Obama.

One inspector general told the paper the Trump administration “does not want anyone in this role who is going to be independent.”

“IGs have done exactly what the president says he wants: to fight fraud waste and abuse and make the government more effective,” the official added. “Firing this many of us makes no sense. It is counter to those goals.”

Collins: ‘I don’t understand’ Trump’s inspectors general firings

Alexander Bolton

THE HILL
Sat 25 January 2025 

Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) said Saturday she didn’t understand why President Trump fired several departmental inspectors general late Friday night given that those positions are crucial to rooting out waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government, one of the president’s stated goals.

“I don’t understand why one would fire individuals whose mission it is to root out waste, fraud and abuse. This leaves a gap in what I know is a priority for President Trump. So I don’t understand it,” Collins said while arriving at the Capitol for a Saturday morning vote.

Trump fired 17 government watchdogs at the Departments of Defense, State, Transportation, Veterans Affairs, Energy, Interior, Housing and Urban Development and other agencies, catching GOP lawmakers by surprise.

“Somebody just mentioned to me downstairs as I was coming in, just heard about it,” said Senate Republican Whip John Barrasso (R-Wyo.).

Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) said he was aware of the move but needs to study it more carefully.

“I heard it, I have not looked at it and I don’t know what it all entails. Honestly, I would just be guessing at this point about what that actually entails. I’ll wait and find out what that means in terms of other people stepping in,” he said.

The surprise move drew strong criticism from Democrats.

“It’s part of his plan to undermine the functioning of the government of the United States so that there’s is no objective person that can make judgments about propriety of his actions,” Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee said of Trump’s action.

“Now he has a much freer pathway to avoid rules, regulations to essentially change the system from one of laws to one of his whims,” he added.

Reed said the Defense Department’s inspector general was responsive to lawmakers’ requests.

“I would give the IG a good grade. They’re very thorough. They have to be that way. When they rendered a report it was factual, accurate and untainted by political bias or any other bias,” he said.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), the ranking member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, said independent inspectors general are “critical” to rooting out waste, fraud and abuse throughout the government.

“It is alarming that President Trump is firing inspectors general from agencies across the federal government, including the Department of Agriculture, removing critical checks on his power,” she said in a statement.

Sen. Ron Wyden (Ore.), the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, declared that Trump is “systematically dismantling the protections against abuse, corruption and fraud within federal government.”

Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. 

Democrat criticizes Trump administration for giving Senate GOP Ukraine documents but not House

(CNN)The Treasury Department is cooperating with a Senate Republican investigation into Hunter Biden's activities in Ukraine, according to a top Democrat on one of the committees.
Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, criticized the Treasury Department for sending over information after it had stonewalled the House's impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump's dealings with Ukraine.

Wyden's office is not saying what documents were turned over and whether they specifically involve Hunter Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden. Three Republican chairmen -- Finance Chairman Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Homeland Security Chairman Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham of South Carolina -- have sent letters in recent months seeking information and interviews related to the Bidens, the Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma and uncorroborated allegations about Ukrainian interference in the 2016 US election. Trump and his allies have repeatedly made unfounded and false claims to allege that the Bidens acted corruptly in Ukraine.

"For its part, the Trump administration refused to comply with all Democratic requests for documents and witnesses associated with impeachment. Applying a blatant double standard, Trump administration agencies like the Treasury Department are rapidly complying with Senate Republican requests -- no subpoenas necessary -- and producing 'evidence' of questionable origin," Wyden spokeswoman Ashley Schapitl said in a statement. "The administration told House Democrats to go pound sand when their oversight authority was mandatory while voluntarily cooperating with the Senate Republicans' sideshow at lightning speed."

A Treasury spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.

Grassley spokesman Taylor Foy said, "As a matter of routine, we don't discuss sensitive third-party material during ongoing investigations. It's unfortunate that Democrats whom we've kept in the loop on our investigations would recklessly seek to interfere with legitimate government oversight."

The Senate Republican investigation into the Bidens, which is being led primarily by Grassley and Johnson, is a sign that while impeachment has ended, the investigations related to Ukraine have not. House Democrats too are still pursuing probes and court cases post-impeachment, and many Democrats want the House to subpoena former national security adviser John Bolton, who was not called in the Senate trial, after senators voted not to hear from witnesses.

It is not clear what Treasury has provided to the Senate committees, which was first reported by Yahoo News. Grassley and Johnson sent a letter dated November 15, 2019 to the director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, Ken Blanco, requesting information related to their investigation "into potentially improper actions by the Obama administration with respect to Burisma Holdings and Ukraine." Johnson and Grassley requested "all Suspicious Activity Reports" -- which financial institutions are required to file when they spot suspicious activity, though the reports don't necessarily indicate wrongdoing occurred -- that were filed related to 11 individuals or entities including Hunter Biden and Burisma Holdings by December 5, 2019.

In addition to the Treasury letter, the Senate Republicans chairmen requested information late last year related to Ukraine from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Attorney General William Barr. In a sign they are still expanding their probe, they sent a new letter on Wednesday to the Secret Service seeking travel information on Hunter Biden.

During the impeachment trial, Trump's lawyers and congressional Republicans defended the President's actions by saying he had legitimate reasons to worry about corruption Joe Biden and Hunter Biden, the latter of whom who worked for Burisma. Multiple witnesses in the impeachment inquiry testified that Biden's actions in Ukraine were consistent with official US government policy, backed by European allies and both Republicans and Democrats in Congress, including Johnson.

In the House, Democrats are still weighing their next steps following the end of the Senate impeachment trial. They never received documents from the Trump administration related to Ukraine, some of which have been released in the weeks since the President was impeached in December thanks to Freedom of Information Act lawsuits. There's also the question of Bolton, who indicated he was willing to testify in the Senate but has not said the same about the House.

House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, a New York Democrat, said Wednesday that it was likely the House would subpoena Bolton, but House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff has not committed to doing so. "We really haven't made any decisions yet," the California Democrat said Thursday when asked about the House's next steps.

In addition to Ukraine threads, House Democrats still have active court cases in their efforts to obtain the President's tax returns, financial and accounting information and the testimony of former White House counsel Don McGahn. Democrats said they expect those investigations into the President to continue, regardless of having already impeached him -- and the committees will continue aggressive oversight of the federal agencies.

"No one thinks that the Senate's act of jury nullification gives the President any immunity from the Congress' oversight power," said Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat on the Oversight and Judiciary committees. "So we will not let up for one second in ferreting out the corruption and the criminality that have overtaken the administration. I believe our oversight power is as necessary as ever, if not more so now. This President appears to be emboldened by the robotic behavior of Republican senators with the notable exception of Mitt Romney."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday noted the ongoing court cases but didn't suggest the Democrats were about to make a new push for testimony from Bolton or others.
"Those cases still exist," the California Democrat said at her weekly news conference. "If there are others that we see as an opportunity, we'll make a judgment at that time. But we have no plans right now."

Treasury Department sent information on Hunter Biden to expanding GOP Senate inquiry


Yahoo News•February 6, 2020

The Treasury Department has complied with Republican senators’ requests for highly sensitive and closely held financial records about Hunter Biden and his associates and has turned over “‘evidence’ of questionable origin” to them, according to a leading Democrat on one of the committees conducting the investigation.

For months, while the impeachment controversy raged, powerful committee chairmen in the Republican-controlled Senate have been quietly but openly pursuing an inquiry into Hunter Biden’s business affairs and Ukrainian officials’ alleged interventions in the 2016 election, the same matters that President Trump and his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani unsuccessfully tried to coerce Ukraine’s government to investigate.

Hunter Biden in 2016. (Teresa Kroeger/Getty Images for World Food Program USA)

Unlike Trump and Giuliani, however, Sens. Charles Grassley, chairman of the Finance Committee; Ron Johnson, chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee; and Lindsey Graham, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, have focused their efforts in Washington, seeking to extract politically useful information from agencies of the U.S. government. They’ve issued letters requesting records from Cabinet departments and agencies, including the State Department, the Treasury, the Justice Department, the FBI, the National Archives and the Secret Service.

Grassley and Johnson have sought to obtain some of the most sensitive and closely held documents in all of federal law enforcement — highly confidential suspicious activity reports (SARs) filed by financial institutions with FinCEN, an agency of the Treasury that helps to police money laundering.

The senators’ requests to the Treasury have borne fruit, according to the ranking Democratic senator on the Finance Committee, Ron Wyden of Oregon, who contrasted the cooperation given to the Republican senators with the pervasive White House-directed stonewall that House Democrats encountered when they subpoenaed documents and witnesses in the impeachment inquiry.

“Applying a blatant double standard, Trump administration agencies like the Treasury Department are rapidly complying with Senate Republican requests — no subpoenas necessary — and producing ‘evidence’ of questionable origin,” Wyden spokesperson Ashley Schapitl said in a statement. “The administration told House Democrats to go pound sand when their oversight authority was mandatory while voluntarily cooperating with the Senate Republicans’ sideshow at lightning speed.”

Sen. Ron Wyden during President Trump's impeachment trial on Jan. 30. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

The “rapid” production of sensitive financial information from the Treasury Department in response to congressional requests is apparently uncommon. A source familiar with the matter said the Treasury began turning over materials less than two months after Grassley and Johnson wrote to FinCEN on Nov. 15, 2019, requesting any SARs and related documents filed by financial institutions regarding Hunter Biden, his associates, their businesses and clients.

Just a couple of weeks later, Wyden and Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, complained to FinCEN in a letter that “information requests from Congress, including legitimate Committee oversight requests related to Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs), often take months to process, and we understand that certain such requests have yet to be answered at all.”

“Sen. Wyden’s warning was spurred by concern that the agency would prioritize Republican requests over Democratic requests,” Schapitl said of the December letter to FinCEN. “Treasury’s subsequent actions have made his concerns even more urgent.”

“It's strange that any senator would complain about receiving responses to oversight requests in a timely manner,” a Grassley spokesperson said to BuzzFeed News on Thursday.

"The Democrats launched a nuclear weapon with impeachment, and then wanted to negotiate while it was in the air — that’s not how oversight works," a Republican Senate aide said, responding to Wyden's comments about a double standard between the GOP investigation and the impeachment inquiry.

Republicans also noted that Sen. Grassley had first raised his concerns about a DNC contractor potentially coordinating with Ukraine in a 2017 letter to the Justice Department.

"Senate Republicans’ investigation ramped up just as the House impeachment investigation ramped up," Schapitl said, "providing an avenue for them to pursue the trumped-up investigation President Zelensky did not announce in the face of President Trump’s extortion scheme."

With the Senate impeachment trial concluded and the Democratic primaries in full swing, the efforts of the Republican-led investigation may soon appear at the center of the political stage. The flow of information from the administration to Senate Republicans has prompted concerns among Democrats that any damaging information uncovered may be deployed at a time of maximum political advantage for the Trump campaign.

“Republicans are turning the Senate into an arm of the president’s political campaign, pursuing an investigation designed to further President Trump’s favorite conspiracy theory that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election and smear Vice President Biden,” Schapitl said. The Biden presidential campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A series of letters and public statements shows that since last autumn the senators have been pursuing a wide-ranging joint inquiry into Hunter Biden’s business affairs in Ukraine at the time his father, Vice President Joe Biden, was leading the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy and into the activities of Ukrainian officials and a Ukrainian-American Democratic political operative during the 2016 election.
Then-Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter at a basketball game in 2010. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)

Aside from the statement from Wyden’s office, there has been scant information about what investigators have uncovered, if anything. Wyden’s statement stopped short of saying whether the “‘evidence’ of questionable origin” produced in compliance with the senators’ request included SARs.

The Bank Secrecy Act of 1970 mandates that banks generate SARs to report to FinCEN any transactions that they know or have reason to suspect violate federal criminal laws or are connected to money laundering. SARs are among the most confidential, closely held documents in federal law enforcement. They are forbidden to be disclosed or have their existence disclosed by banks or government authorities, are exempt from the Freedom of Information Act and are privileged in most cases from discovery by civil litigants.

Because SARs may be, and indeed are required to be, filed simply on the basis of a reasonable suspicion of illegal activity, the existence of a SAR doesn’t indicate that illegal activity has actually occurred.

The Republican Senate staff conducting the investigation did not respond to inquiries, and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee declined to comment. Treasury, State and Justice did not respond to inquiries. The FBI declined to comment.

The National Archives and Records Administration said that it had not turned over any records to the Senate yet, but that a review of the request by the White House and the office of President Barack Obama, which has purview over some of the records, is ongoing. “NARA has been in regular contact with committee staff,” a spokesperson said in a statement.

The Secret Service, which only received its request from the Republican investigators after the acquittal vote of the president on Wednesday, could not be immediately reached for comment.

From their letters, it’s clear that the senators’ inquiry into the Bidens deals with the same subject matter that Trump and Giuliani’s pressure campaign sought to place under scrutiny. Their interest in suspected Ukrainian influences on the 2016 election, however, has a different point of emphasis.

Instead of the debunked CrowdStrike conspiracy theory that Trump alluded to on his call with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky or similar unsubstantiated theories positing that Ukraine was somehow behind the hacking of the Democratic National Committee, the senators have focused on a controversial January 2017 Politico article that alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 presidential election to help Hillary Clinton defeat Trump.

The article relied heavily on the allegations of Andrii Telizhenko, then a diplomat in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington, who said he was asked by Alexandra Chalupa, a Democratic Party consultant, to get dirt on Paul Manafort, who was then the campaign manager for Trump. Telizhenko has since cast himself as a central figure in Giuliani’s Ukraine investigations.

Rudy Giuliani and Andrii Telizhenko in a photo posted last May 22. (Andrii Telizhenko via Facebook)

The Politico article has been seized on by Trump’s defenders as evidence that there was Ukrainian interference in the U.S. presidential election similar to the Kremlin-directed influence campaign.

“Whether there’s a connection between Democratic operatives and Ukrainian officials during the 2016 election has yet to be determined,” Graham said in a December statement. “It will only be found by looking. We intend to look.”

National security officials who served in the Trump administration have rejected the notion that Ukrainian efforts against Trump were coordinated or could be reasonably be likened to Russia’s systematic election interference campaign, which intelligence agencies have assessed was led by President Vladimir Putin himself.

“It is a fiction that the Ukrainian government was launching an effort to upend our election, upend our election to mess with our Democratic systems,” Fiona Hill, a former National Security Council official in Trump’s White House, testified at her House deposition in October.

Yet throughout the fall and early winter, Republican senators peppered executive branch officials with request letters on both the Bidens and the Ukraine interference theory that Hill had implored Congress to avoid.

Grassley and Johnson courted controversy with a letter to the Justice Department seeking to obtain a broad swath of information that Chalupa, the Democratic Party consultant, says she voluntarily provided to the FBI in 2016 when she felt harassed by Russian hacking.

In a January response letter to the Justice Department, Wyden called the request “outrageous.”

“To use [Chalupa’s] voluntary cooperation in order to weaponize her personal information against her in furtherance of a political attack based on unsupported claims and potential Russian propaganda would compromise public trust in our law enforcement, undermine Americans’ rights, and damage our national security interests,” he wrote.

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Conspiracy-mongers in Congress: Republicans go off the deep end

Opinion by Glenn C. Altschuler, opinion contributor • July 22, 2023

Conspiracy-mongers in Congress: Republicans go off the deep end© Provided by The Hill

“The most durable narratives are not the ones that stand up to fact-checking. They’re the ones that address our deepest needs and desires,” journalist George Packer once acknowledged. But, he warned, “when facts become fungible, we’re lost.”

These days, in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, conspiracy theories are in the saddle, and facts have become fungible.

During the testimony of John Kerry before a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee a couple of weeks ago, Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) accused the U.S. Climate Envoy of hyping a global warming “problem that doesn’t exist.” When Kerry pointed to the consensus of climate scientists and the 195 nations that signed the Paris Accords, Perry declared they were “grifting, just like you.” In the 117th Congress, according to one study, 52 percent of House Republicans and 60 percent of Senate Republicans were climate skeptics or deniers. Every time soil or a rock “is deposited into the seas,” opined Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) “that forces the sea levels to rise because now you’ve got less space in those oceans because the bottom is moving.”

In May, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) introduced articles of impeachment against FBI Director Christopher Wray. More recently, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chair of the House Judiciary Committee, alleged that the Bureau spied on Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign “raided” the former president’s home and targeted conservatives in a “double standard” of the system of justice. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) described the Bureau as a “creepy personal snooping machine.” Blasting the FBI as “tyrannical,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) claimed agents “stormed” the home of an anti-abortion activist and arrested him.

The FBI did not “raid” Mar-a-Lago, Wray said; agents acted pursuant to a search warrant approved by a judge. “There are specific rules about where to store classified information,” Wray added, “and in my experience, ballrooms, bathrooms, and bedrooms are not SCIFs” (Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities). In the case of the anti-abortion activist, agents knocked on his door and “asked him to exit. He did without incident.” Given his background as a registered Republican who was appointed by President Trump, Wray concluded, “the idea that I’m biased against conservatives seems somewhat insane to me.”

In May, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) issued a press release: “Grassley, Comer Demand FBI Record Alleging Criminal Scheme Involving Then VP Biden.” Hours later Grassley tweeted, “I can’t verify whether or not it’s really criminal activity…” Two weeks ago, the DOJ unsealed an indictment filed on Nov. 1, 2022, charging Gal Luft, a dual citizen of the United States and Israel, with arms trafficking, sanctions violations, lying to the FBI, and acting as an unregistered agent for China. Arrested in Cyprus in February 2023, Luft skipped bail in April and may now be hiding in Israel. If convicted, he faces up to 100 years in prison.

After acknowledging that Luft was the whistleblower he and Grassley had referenced, Rep. James Comer (R-Tenn.), chair of the House Oversight Committee, insisted he “is a very credible witness.” Comer alleged Luft was the left’s “worst nightmare,” because the FBI had flown to Brussels to interview him, only to insist as well that the Bureau “never investigated any of this. They turned a complete blind eye.” In another non sequitur, Comer stated that Luft had been charged with failing to register as a foreign agent, “which is the main thing we’ve said the Bidens were all along.”

House Republicans joined Comer in suggesting, without evidence, that Luft had been indicted because he had accused the Bidens of wrongdoing. “I don’t trust the DOJ or FBI. They are trying to silence our witnesses,” maintained Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.). As Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) recommended immunity from prosecution in exchange for Luft’s testimony against the Bidens, Comer doubled down on his undocumented assertion that “the president of the United States and his family has taken millions of dollars from a company that’s 100 percent wholly owned by the Chinese Communist Party.”

There are 154 House Republicans who claim the 2020 presidential election was stolen; objected to certifying the Electoral College results; supported recounts in swing states; or attended and/or supported the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol who returned or were newly elected to Congress in November 2022. A couple of weeks ago, GOP Chair Ronna McDaniel told CNN’s Chris Wallace “I don’t think he [Biden] won it fair.” The only evidence she cited — a woman from Wayne County, Michigan, who claimed she was told to backdate ballots, and the removal of Republican poll watchers — has been debunked.

McDaniel did not mention that more than 60 court cases challenging the results were rejected. In one of them, Stephanos Bibas, who was appointed to the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit by President Trump, summarized a simple principle MAGA Republicans and their enablers continue to ignore. Charges of unfairness, Judge Bibas agreed, “are serious.” But such charges “require specific allegations and then proof. We have neither here.”

Let’s hope all Americans keep this principle in mind if, as expected, former President Trump is indicted again in the near future.

Glenn C. Altschuler is the Thomas and Dorothy Litwin Professor of American Studies at Cornell University. He is the co-author (with Stuart Blumin) of “Rude Republic: Americans and Their Politics in the Nineteenth Century.”

Trump Cabinet official doubts seniors would be upset over missed Social Security payments

Carl Gibson

March 21, 2025
ALTERNET

One of President Donald Trump's closest advisors is now suggesting that most of the tens of millions of Americans who rely on Social Security wouldn't be concerned if they didn't receive their benefits.

During a recent appearance on the All-In Podcast with Chamath Palihapitiya and David Friedberg, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick vociferously defended the Trump administration's mass firings and budget cuts to multiple federal agencies. He also heaped praise on South African centibillionaire Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) — particularly his controversial goal of cutting Social Security.

In one exchange, Lutnick — who has a net worth of approximately $2 billion according to Investopedia — suggested that the best approach to root out fraud within the Social Security Administration (SSA) was to "stop payments and listen." He also argued that only a "fraudster" would call the SSA if they missed their monthly Social Security payment.

"I describe it to people this way: Let's say Social Security didn't send out their checks this month. My mother-in-law, who is 94, she wouldn't call and complain. She just wouldn't. She'd think something got messed up, and she'll get it next month," said Lutnick, who paid for his 16,250 square-foot mansion with $25 million in cash. "A fraudster always makes the loudest noise, screaming, yelling and complaining."

"Elon [Musk] knows this by heart," he continued. "Anyone who's been in the payment system and the process system knows the easiest way to find a fraudster is to stop payments and listen. Because whoever screams is the one stealing!"

Lutnick's assertion that Social Security beneficiaries would be unbothered by a missed payment ignores the fact that for millions of recipients, those monthly benefits are critical. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, nearly four in 10 American adults aged 65 and up would have incomes below the official poverty line without Social Security. Alex Lawson, who is executive director of the advocacy group Social Security Works, told AlterNet that Lutnick's remarks reveal "the problem with government by the billionaires for the billionaires."

"They have no idea what life is like for ordinary Americans. Living in lazy luxury means Lutnick cannot understand that for millions of Americans, missing a single Social Security check means they can’t eat, they can’t pay their rent, they can’t live," Lawson said. "I cannot imagine a more offensive and out of touch comment, it would be funny if it weren’t actually terrifying.”

Watch the video of Lutnick's comments below, or by clicking this link.

Trump's Billionaire Commerce Secretary: Only 'Fraudsters' Will Complain If Social Security Checks Don't Arrive

One group noted who would actually complain: "Someone who depends on Social Security to buy groceries. Someone who depends on Social Security to pay rent. Someone who depends on Social Security to survive."

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick speaks to an aide on the North Lawn of the White House on March 14, 2025 in Washington, D.C

(Photo: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
Mar 21, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

As U.S. President Donald Trump's temporary leader of the Social Security Administration threatened to shut down the agency over an unfavorable court ruling on Friday, the billionaire commerce secretary came under fire for suggesting that only "fraudsters" will complain if they don't get their earned benefits.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick appeared on All-In—a podcast hosted by "four billionaire besties"—on Thursday. A brief clip of his interview, which lasted an hour and 45 minutes, made the rounds on social media Friday.

Lutnick told two of the hosts that if the SSA didn't send out checks this month, his 94-year-old mother-in-law "wouldn't call and complain," but "a fraudster always makes the loudest noise, screaming, yelling, and complaining."



Critics were quick to point out Lutnick's wealth. As More Perfect Unionposted, "His net worth is estimated at $2 billion."

Richard Phillips, pensions and tax policy director for U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Ranking Member Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), called the commerce secretary's comments "shameful."


"Nearly 40% of seniors rely on Social Security for a majority of their income and nearly 1 in 7 rely on it for more than 90% of their income," according to Phillips. "These people would call due to missing checks because their very survival depends on it."


The watchdog group Public Citizen similarly pushed back on social media, saying: "You know who actually makes the loudest noise? Someone who depends on Social Security to buy groceries. Someone who depends on Social Security to pay rent. Someone who depends on Social Security to survive. But billionaires like Howard Lutnick don't care about those people."

Groundwork Collaborative chief of policy and advocacy Alex Jacquez said in a statement that "the Trump administration just told seniors that they should shut up and sit down if they don't receive their Social Security checks on time. The real 'fraudsters' are Trump's out-of-touch billionaire donors and advisers denying seniors their hard-earned benefits to pay for their next tax giveaway."

Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, a union for federal workers, also tied Lutnick's remarks to Republican tax ambitions—as well as a broader attack on the federal bureaucracy by Trump and the de facto leader of his Department of Government Efficiency( DOGE), billionaire Elon Musk.

"First, Elon called Social Security a 'Ponzi scheme' and said we need to eliminate it," Kelley said. "Then DOGE started trying to cut SSA staff. Now Lutnick says 'don't complain' when the payments stop. They are taking money from working-class people in order to give it to their rich friends."

As Common Dreamsreported earlier Friday, acting Social Security Administration Commissioner Leland Dudek is threatening to shut down the agency in response to a federal judge's Thursday order blocking DOGE's SSA "data grab." The Washington Post later revealed that the official "is consulting with agency lawyers and the Justice Department" about the possible shutdown.



Some political observers see the Republican administration's attacks on the SSA—and the rest of the federal government—as a major opportunity for the Democratic Party, which has minorities in both chambers of Congress.

"If Dems have any strategic mojo left, they will clip this and play it on a nonstop television ad loop in the two Florida districts holding special congressional elections," Helaine Olen of the American Economic Liberties Project said about the Lutnick interview. "Seniors will rightly whine when their checks don't show up."

Already, some seniors have publicly shared stories of benefits incorrectly shut off since Trump took office, and some congressional Democrats are taking aim at his administration. Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.), a longtime SSA defender who has framed the DOGE assault as a push toward privatization, posted the commerce secretary's video on social media.

"Trump and Musk's cuts to the Social Security Administration could lead to the delay, denial, and disruption of your EARNED BENEFITS," Larson said Friday. "For 40% of our seniors, Social Security is the only income they have. They can't just wait for their next check."

Also responding to the clip, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said, "They are getting ready to destroy Social Security. Because the billionaires don't need it. Prepping the ground here by shaming people who dare complain if their Social Security check disappears."

The Social Security comments aren't the only reason the commerce secretary is facing intense criticism this week. On Wednesday, he told viewers of Fox News' "Jesse Watters Primetime" to buy stock in Musk's electric vehicle maker, Tesla. One watchdog leader noted that Lutnick "conveniently forgot to mention his family business empire holds nearly $840 million in the company."

The nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center on Friday filed a complaint with the Office of Government Ethics and an ethics official at the U.S. Department of Commerce, urging them to investigate Lutnick's comments about Tesla stock—which has been crashing due to protests of the company resulting from Musk's work for the Trump administration.

'Despicable': Trump Official Threatens Total Social Security Shutdown Over DOGE Ruling

"Rather than comply with a lawful court order, he wants to see millions of families, retirees, and disabled individuals go hungry, suffer, and potentially lose their homes all to curry favor with anti-worker billionaires."


Protesters hold signs targeting billionaire Elon Musk at a Tesla dealership in New York City on March 13, 2025.
(Photo: Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
Mar 21, 2025
CONNON DREAMS

Defenders of the Social Security Administration on Friday blasted acting Commissioner Leland Dudek's threat to shut down the agency in response to a federal judge cutting off the Department of Government Efficiency's access to SSA data.

U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander wrote Thursday that "the DOGE team is essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA." She issued a temporary restraining order targeting affiliates of the government-gutting entity created by Republican President Donald Trump and led by Big Tech CEO Elon Musk, the richest person on the planet.

While the advocacy and labor groups behind the lawsuit celebrated the order from Hollander—who was appointed to the District of Maryland by former President Barack Obama—Dudek responded to the ruling with a threat to shut down the agency entirely.

"My anti-fraud team would be DOGE affiliates. My IT staff would be DOGE affiliates," Dudek told Bloomberg. "As it stands, I will follow it exactly and terminate access by all SSA employees to our IT systems."

"Now, like a child who didn't get his way, he is threatening to shut down Social Security."

Dudek—who is leading the SSA until the U.S. Senate decides whether to confirm Trump's nominee, former Fiserv CEO Frank Bisignano—said he would ask the judge to immediately clarify her order, adding: "Really, I want to turn it off and let the courts figure out how they want to run a federal agency."

Lee Saunders, president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME)—which filed the suit with the Alliance for Retired Americans and the American Federation of Teachers—said in a Friday statement that "for almost 90 years, Social Security has never missed a paycheck—but 60 days into this administration, Social Security is now on the brink."

"Acting Commissioner Leland Dudek has proven again that he is in way over his head, compromising the privacy of millions of Americans, shutting down services that senior citizens rely on, and planning debilitating layoffs, all in service to Elon Musk's lies," he continued. "Now, like a child who didn't get his way, he is threatening to shut down Social Security. Rather than comply with a lawful court order, he wants to see millions of families, retirees, and disabled individuals go hungry, suffer, and potentially lose their homes all to curry favor with anti-worker billionaires. It's despicable."

"Even for this administration, this is a new low. Project 2025 didn't dare mention Social Security, but we always knew they would put it on the table," he added, citing a Heritage Foundation-led blueprint for remaking the government. "We've fought back efforts by anti-union extremists and billionaires to privatize and gut Social Security before, and we'll do it again. Workers paid into this program; it belongs to us."



Groups that are not part of the case also took aim at Dudek on Friday. Max Richtman, president and CEO of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, called the threat "to hold hostage" the earned benefits of over 70 million people "inexcusable" and "yet another example of the Trump administration's hostility to American seniors."

"Dudek is throwing a temper tantrum—claiming that if DOGE can't access American's data, neither can anyone else," he said. "No one in the federal government has the breadth of access to data that Elon Musk has demanded. Social Security employees' access is compartmentalized and only made available on a 'need-to-know' basis, and those with access to the data go through rigorous screening, training, and are subject to fines and/or jail time for violating this policy."

Richtman asserted that "Musk's continued effort to justify his actions by doubling down on thoroughly debunked claims of 'massive fraud' at SSA are being laid bare as a mere pretext for acquiring every American's personal information—which could then be used as weapons against anyone who disagrees with the Trump administration's actions."



Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, declared that "Dudek's leadership has been the darkest in Social Security's nearly 90-year history. He has sown chaos and destruction... His highest loyalty is to Elon Musk and Donald Trump, not to the beneficiaries that the agency is meant to serve. Singlehandedly, he has taken the security out of Social Security."

"Members of Congress who remain silent are complicit. The Trump-nominated commissioner, who will have his confirmation hearing next week, is no better. In fact, he proudly calls himself 'a DOGE person,'" she warned of Bisignano.

"Every member of Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike, must condemn the destruction of our Social Security system and demand that the Trump administration follow Judge Hollander's order," Altman added. "They must make it clear that no president—even one who thinks he is a king—can shut down our Social Security system."

'This is not right!' Elderly woman explodes at GOP senator over Social Security cuts

A woman asks a question to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) during a town hall on March 21, 2025 (Image: Screengrab via @IAStartingLine / X)

Carl Gibson

March 21, 2025

ALTERNET

The most tenured Senate Republican recently held a town hall in his solidly red state, and was confronted by angry constituents upset with his support of President Donald Trump's most controversial actions.

Iowa Starting Line reported that Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) faced a combative crowd in Hampton, Iowa on Friday. The outlet posted videos of attendees grilling the Hawkeye State's senior U.S. senator over various topics, though many were primarily concerned about Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and its steep cuts to multiple federal agencies.

In one exchange, an elderly woman questioned Grassley about his support of DOGE's cuts to Social Security offices and staff. According to DOGE's "wall of receipts," leases on nearly two dozen Social Security offices across the country are not being renewed. Iowa Starting Line posted the video of the woman's question, in which she explained her concern over the mass firings within the Social Security Administration (SSA).

"That is not right!" The woman told Grassley. "We don't want people to call on the phone to change their direct deposit. Go to a local office. Try to get an appointment at a local office! Right now you're waiting a month. And were going to cut more staff? This is not right, and we do not want to see Social Security privatized."

Grassley pushed back on constituents' arguments that DOGE is violating the law, and said that Musk's effort is similar to what he had seen under two Democratic presidents during his time in the U.S. Senate. He noted that former President Bill Clinton once gave a speech in which he said: "The era of big government is over." Grassley also quoted former President Barack Obama, who had pledged in 2011 to root out "waste, fraud and abuse" in federal agencies. However, the crowd audibly disagreed.

"You don't find [waste, fraud and abuse] by just saying, 'OK, I'm gonna cut off your funding.' That's no way of finding fraud," one constituent said, to loud applause.

The Hampton town hall was the latest of Grassley's stops across Iowa in a tour of all 99 counties. Earlier this week, local ABC affiliate KCRG reported that a town hall in Dysart was also packed full of angry constituents who voiced concerns about the Trump administration and DOGE. Grassley acknowledged at the end of the town hall that "there were a lot of tough questions" and that "a lot of people are mad about what's going on in the Trump administration."

Watch the video below, or by clicking this link.