Social Security Administration is Labeling Living People — Especially Immigrants — as Dead
Administratively "killing" U.S. citizens is ostensibly meant to uncover fraud and save the government money. Doing the same to immigrants is designed to encourage them to self-deport.
Donald Trump and Elon Musk have been falsely claiming that millions of dead people are receiving social security benefits. The mainstream press has actually done a good job of debunking this lie.
In a new twist, the Social Security Administration (SSA) is effectively canceling certain immigrants’ social security numbers by placing those numbers in a “death master file” — essentially labeling the holders of those numbers as dead — as a way of encouraging the individuals to self-deport.
A government that cannot deport people in large enough numbers to satisfy its base is opting to make life so miserable for immigrants that they will leave on their own accord. This is also another step in efforts to turn multiple federal agencies into immigration enforcement units.
Personal Anecdotes About SSA Declaring Living People Dead
I’ve read a number of recent accounts of people being notified of their own deaths by the SSA, and having their social security payments frozen.
Earlier this week, someone I know personally told me that the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) sent him a condolence letter on the death of his wife, who I can confirm is very much alive. The wife has been trying to convince the VA and SSA that she has not passed on, but even appearing in person more than once at her local SSA and VA offices has not yet been proof enough to rectify the error.
On the other hand, when my mother died in November 2024, I learned that funeral directors are required by law to notify the SSA of all deaths. The normal monthly deposits of social security payments into my mother’s bank account were halted right away. The SSA then notified the New Jersey Division of Taxation, which in turn notified her bank, which immediately froze her back accounts (even those on which I was already a co-owner, which is another story). So the SSA actually seems to have a pretty efficient death-reporting machine — or at least it did before Trump took office.
Making Life So Difficult for Immigrants That They Will Choose to “Self-Deport”
Undocumented immigrants cannot obtain social security numbers. But most lawful immigrants can. According to the New York Times, the SSA is canceling the social security numbers of certain immigrants by moving those numbers into the agency’s so-called “death master file.” This is a file “which for years has been used to track dead people who should no longer receive benefits” but is now being repurposed “to include the names of living people who the government believes should be treated as if they are dead.”
What exactly is the impact of canceling someone’s social security number? Well, here are just a few examples:
Without a social security number, a person cannot hold a U.S. bank account.
You cannot obtain a credit card without a social security number.
Most immigrants do not qualify for government benefits, but the few that do will not be able to demonstrate their eligibility without a social security number. This could include critical, life-saving benefits such as Medicaid.
To work legally in the United States, you have to provide your employer with a social security number.
And let’s not forget that you have to provide your social security number (or, if you don’t have one, your individual taxpayer ID number) in order to file a tax return.
So not having a social security number pushes immigrants into the shadows, into the underground economy, and punishes those who were trying to comply with the law.
The government claims it has only added a few thousand names of people it says are convicted criminals or suspected terrorists to the SSA’s “death master file.” Hmmm … where have we heard this before? Weren’t those Venezuelans who were deported to the Salvadoran prison camp also deemed to be convicted criminals or suspected terrorists? But hasn’t it turned out that the government has produced no evidence to support those allegations?
First they came for the alleged criminal alien terrorists,
But I did not speak out
Because I was not a criminal alien terrorist.
Nowadays, the government can call any immigrant an “alien enemy” or a criminal or a terrorist and then do anything it wants to them. Are we making America great yet?
Turning the SSA and IRS into Immigration Enforcement Agencies
In addition to misusing SSA records to put pressure on lawful immigrants, the Trump regime is leveraging IRS records against tax-paying immigrants.
In 1996, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) created something called an individual taxpayer identification number (ITIN). An ITIN can be used by foreign nationals who are not eligible for a social security number so that they can comply with U.S. tax laws.
Believe it or not, many undocumented immigrants who are employed in the United States or own their own businesses obtain ITINs (since they cannot obtain social security numbers) so that they can pay their taxes. Possessing an ITIN does not provide a person with any kind of lawful status, and undocumented immigrants who pay into Social Security are not eligible to collect benefits when they retire. Nonetheless, many undocumented immigrants obtain ITINs in order to do the right thing, and hopefully pave the way to obtaining lawful status later.
Now the IRS, which has historically protected the confidentiality of tax records, has agreed to turn over information about undocumented immigrants to the Department of Homeland Security. This information will help Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) track down undocumented immigrants for possible deportation.
As I said in my blog yesterday, it’s almost as if the government just wants to rid the United States of immigrants! I wonder why that is.
