Social Security push

Obama's Social Security push pleases liberals

By Sarah Wheaton

President Barack Obama called for expanding Social Security on Wednesday, prompting progressive groups to declare victory after they tangled with him over a plan to save costs in the entitlement program three years ago.

“And not only do we need to strengthen its long-term health, it’s time we finally made Social Security more generous and increased its benefits so that today’s retirees and future generations get the dignified retirement that they’ve earned,” Obama said in an economic call to arms in Elkhart, Indiana. “We could start paying for it by asking the wealthiest Americans to contribute a little bit more.”

The White House dismissed suggestions that Obama’s statement marked any policy change.

“For many years — dating back to before he became president — President Obama has made clear that we need to strengthen Social Security,” a White House official wrote in an email. “In his speech today, the president reiterated that as we ensure the program’s solvency for generations to come, we should also enhance benefits so that Americans can retire with dignity.”

But while Obama repeatedly called for ways to shore up the Social Security trust fund — including possibly taxing the rich — he said, as he ran for reelection in 2012, that he would not “slash benefits” or privatize the program.

However, it’s unclear whether he has officially backed expanding benefits. In fact, in 2013, he endorsed a plan to change the way cost-of-living increases are measured for Social Security, to a formula known as “chained CPI,” that would have slowed the growth of checks relative to inflation.

The proposal, an attempt to find compromise with Republicans, made liberals livid. They threatened to mount primary challenges against Democrats who signed on and delivered petitions with millions of signatures calling on him to drop the idea.

When the chained CPI idea disappeared from Obama’s budget blueprint in 2014, progressives declared victory, and some say it has emboldened them in their more recent fight against a major Obama priority: the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

“If anyone has ever wondered what impact the grass-roots political revolution behind Bernie Sanders is having on the future of the Democratic Party, the sharp, populist progressive turn that President Obama made today on Social Security expansion should answer those questions," said Democracy for America chairman Jim Dean in a statement.

Progressives’ wariness of Obama on Social Security goes back even further than the chained-CPI fight. Democrats expressed early concern in 2009 about his plan to create a Social Security task force, and in 2011, Sanders even suggested that a primary challenger for Obama would scare him away from cutting benefits. In 2015, Sanders spearheaded a letter signed by other Democratic members of Congress, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), calling on Obama to fill gaps in shrinking retirement plans by expanding Social Security. Obama spoke of similar pressures on Wednesday.

“Fewer and fewer people have pensions they can really count on, which is why Social Security is more important than ever,” Obama said.

The White House official suggested everyone is reading too much into Obama’s latest statement.

“As the president said today, there are a number of steps we should take to make sure everyone who works hard has a fair shot at opportunity and security in today’s economy,” the official said. “Continuing the discussion about strengthening Social Security will be an important part of that effort.”