Outdated records don’t necessarily indicate fraudulent Social Security payments to deceased individuals, SSA’s new chief said.
The new head of the Social Security Administration (SSA) on Wednesday addressed speculations that millions of deceased individuals over the age of 100 may be receiving Social Security benefits, stating that they are likely exaggerated.
Acting SSA Commissioner Lee Dudek, appointed recently by President Donald Trump, issued a statement on Feb. 19, clarifying concerns raised by Trump, DOGE frontman Elon Musk, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt. The three had said in social media posts and press briefings that SSA records list individuals as being 100, 200, or even 300 years old—raising questions about potential improper payments.
Dudek said he wants to “acknowledge recent reporting about the number of people older than age 100 who may be receiving benefits from Social Security,” adding that the “reported data are people in our records with a Social Security number who do not have a date of death associated with their record.”
“These individuals are not necessarily receiving benefits,” Dudek said, while expressing confidence in the audits conducted by DOGE, which Trump has tasked with uncovering any fraud, waste, and abuse in government spending.
“I am confident that with DOGE’s help and the commitment of our executive team and workforce, that Social Security will continue to deliver for the American people,” Dudek said.
Trump said at a Florida press briefing on Feb. 18 that DOGE’s findings suggest “millions and millions” of centenarians may be receiving benefits improperly. This is “obviously fraudulent or incompetent,” he said.
“If you take all of those millions of people off Social Security, all of a sudden, we have a very powerful Social Security with people that are 80 and 70 and 90, but not 200 years old,” the president said.
“It’s a very positive thing” that DOGE had shed light on the potential issue, Trump said. “We’re figuring it out.”
Musk echoed these concerns on social media.
“Maybe Twilight is real, and there are a lot of vampires collecting Social Security,” he joked in one post. In another, he wrote: “Having tens of millions of people marked as ‘ALIVE’ when they are definitely dead is a HUGE problem. Some of them would have been alive before America existed as a country. Think about that for a second.”
Musk also criticized the lack of action on past government reports that highlighted the issue. “What’s super weird is that the @USGAO pointed out years ago that millions of dead people were tagged as alive by Social Security, but nothing was done!” he wrote.
Leavitt said in an appearance on Fox News that Musk and DOGE have been working to identify fraud at the SSA. “They haven’t dug into the books yet but they suspect that there are tens of millions of deceased people receiving fraudulent Social Security payments,” she said.
Concerns about outdated records are not new. SSA’s Office of the Inspector General has noted the presence of inactive Social Security numbers and that the records don’t necessarily mean fraudulent payments are occurring.
A March 2015 report and a July 2023 follow-up found that the SSA had not updated its system to properly annotate death information for approximately 18.9 million people born in 1920 or earlier who were not officially marked as deceased. The reports also stated that “almost none” of these individuals were actively receiving benefits.
The SSA ultimately decided not to update the database due to the cost, which was estimated to exceed $9 million. Additionally, since September 2015, SSA policy has automatically stopped payments to anyone listed as older than 115 years old.
The extent of improper Social Security payments remains uncertain.
A July 2024 report from the Social Security inspector general found that, between fiscal years 2015 and 2022, the agency distributed nearly $8.6 trillion in benefits. Of that amount, $71.8 billion, less than 1 percent, was classified as improper payments, with the majority being overpayments to living recipients rather than deceased individuals.
Additionally, in early January, the U.S. Treasury recovered more than $31 million in various federal payments—not limited to Social Security—that had been mistakenly sent to deceased individuals. Former Treasury official David Lebryk described the recovery efforts as “just the tip of the iceberg.”