Scott Bessent is a true blue Republican
One of the most memorable lines of the Trump era has to be the one spoken by Iowa GOP Senator Joni Ernst when she snapped in response to a constituent lamenting that Medicaid cuts mean people are going to die: “we’re all going to die for heaven’s sakes folks.” It’s a somewhat crude example of the nihilistic attitude that permeates the Republican party these days, an apparent belief that nothing matters anymore. They aren’t even trying to hide it.
When Donald Trump came on the scene in 2015 he did something a little bit different than other Republicans had done in their campaigns. He promised that he would not touch Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. At the time the big so-called entitlement was Obamacare which he pledged to eliminate immediately (“It will be so easy!”) upon taking office and replace with something much cheaper and better. That seemed to appease the small government fanatics on the right, at least temporarily, many of whom had been scalded by the last failed attempt to cut Social Security in 2005 and the subsequent financial crisis in 2007-2008 which illustrated in living color the tremendous risk of putting Americans’ guaranteed retirement into the stock market.
Still, Trump was an outlier. At the time Trump made his bold promise, the front-runners for the nomination such as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Florida Sen Marco Rubio were both campaigning on plans to cut benefits and raise the retirement age, which was greeted, as usual, with delirious excitement by the beltway press which is forever lecturing the people about how they need to take their medicine and resign themselves to living in penury in their old age. After all, the man who had popularized the negative narrative about Social Security and Medicare bankrupting the country was the sainted Ronald Reagan who had built his political career on it.
Reagan was a consummate showman and in the days before Twitter and tik-tok, very adroitly used the technology of the early 1960s to spread the anti-government gospel. Social Security was a successful program that challenged fundamental assumptions of conservatism and they couldn’t have that. He produced a record album called “A Time For Choosing” in which he made a case that Social Security was a bad deal for the average American:
A young man, 21 years of age, working at an average salary — his Social Security contribution would, in the open market, buy him an insurance policy that would guarantee 220 dollars a month at age 65. The government promises 127. He could live it up until he’s 31 and then take out a policy that would pay more than Social Security. Now are we so lacking in business sense that we can’t put this program on a sound basis, so that people who do require those payments will find they can get them when they’re due — that the cupboard isn’t bare?
That “young man” would be 82 today and would very likely be immensely grateful for the guaranteed income social security provides. There’s no doubt that he’s happy his 21 year old self hadn’t been tasked with “investing” for his old age since he’d lived through the boom and bust cycles that probably would have forced him to start over completely more than once. That’s what happened to people before Social Security was created (and there were times in our history when more than 50% of elderly people were living in poverty.) Moreover, Social Security provided the safety net for spouses and children is someone died or they became disabled, something that can happen to anyone.
But despite the success of the programs, the Republicans have never given up on cutting the safety net programs, eliminating them if at all possible. In many ways it is their basic organizing principle even though it’s always been extremely unpopular. And they keep trying to do it even though they have now taken up Donald Trump’s tactic of simply lying and telling people they aren’t doing what they’re doing.
That’s part of the plan too. Back in 1980 Ronald Reagan proposed major cuts to Social Security. But the backlash was strong which led the libertarians at the Cato Institute to call for a “Leninist” strategy to be ready to pounce when the opportunity arises.
The Project on Social Security Privatization, was created to get the public ready to accept the idea of transitioning social security to private accounts in the markets. They finally got around to trying it in 2005 and it flamed out like a SpaceX rocket. And that was before the market crashed in 2008, making everyone realize just how risky such a scheme would be.
Apparently, it’s time to try again. Yes, the Republicans staged a full blown tantrum back in 2023 when President Joe Biden suggested in his State of the Union address that they wanted to cut the programs but nobody believed them since 75% of the Republicans in Congress had just endorsed the cuts the previous summer. They had even proposed work requirements for seniors, one of their favorite ploys to cuts benefits!
That didn’t go anywhere but it does show that no matter what they say or what their Dear Leader Donald Trump may ordain, this is not coming off the menu. In fact, we know that they’ve come up with yet another deceptive end run to get the job done. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent spilled the beans just the other day.
You’ll recall that within the idiotically named “One Big Beautiful Bill” they created another embarrassingly named policy called “Trump Accounts” which are a new retirement savings account for babies that supposedly will be opened with $1000 from the government. Speaking at an event hosted by Breitbart News, Bessent suggested the accounts would be so popular that the people will demand that the government replace social security with it. “In a way, it is a backdoor for privatizing Social Security,” Bessent said
The White House quickly walked back his comments, saying that they have no intention of privatizing Social Security, yadda, yadda yadda. But they aren’t going to be around forever. and it’s clear the Republican party has not changed its goals one bit. As Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said about Bessent’s little truth bomb:
Between Bessent’s comments and the harm DOGE has already done to the agency, it’s clear Trump was lying all along about protecting Social Security. Like every Republican administration going back multiple generations, Trump and his billionaire cabinet want to privatize Social Security to give their Wall Street buddies a payday.”
The GOP will never give that up no matter what. The fight to protect the social safety net remains the essential mission of the Democratic Party.
Salon