The Trump administration has backed down on a plan to withhold Social Security checks from recipients who were allegedly overpaid by the government in the past.
In March, the Social Security Administration announced it would withhold 100% of monthly payments as part of a plan to claw back overpayments. But in an “emergency message” to staff last week, it announced it would now withhold just 50% of each check until the money is repaid.
The agency has long sought to recoup the billions of dollars it mistakenly sends out because of administrative errors, outdated income data or other personal changes that would have reduced a recipient’s monthly benefit.
A 2023 investigation by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group revealed that more than 2 million people each year were being docked for overpayments often made years earlier — more than twice what the agency had told Congress. The Social Security Administration’s own research has also shown that clawbacks were “most prevalent” among Black and Hispanic recipients.
As a result, the agency capped withholding at 10% under President Joe Biden, with Martin O’Malley — the head of the SSA at the time — saying it would stop “clawback cruelty.”
But the Trump administration’s efforts to boost clawbacks spurred a backlash, with a group of Democratic members of the House recently introducing a bill to cap it by law at 10%. The change also came at the same time as broader protests happening around the country about possible changes to Social Security due to the Elon Musk-led DOGE effort.
Still, critics said the constantly changing policy is sowing confusion.
“It creates more work for SSA,” Kate Lang, director of federal income security at the advocacy group Justice in Aging, told KFF Health News. “More people calling with questions, more errors being made that need to be corrected, more confusion and uncertainty about what is going on.”
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