GOP battle erupts over Social Security bill

Republican senators battled behind closed doors Tuesday over a proposal to beef up Social Security benefits for people who are eligible for non-Social Security government pensions.

The legislation, which has passed the House, is expected to reach the Senate floor Wednesday, but some Republicans who are worried about its price tag are hoping to stop it dead.

One GOP senator who attended Tuesday’s meeting described it as “an intense discussion.”

“I think most of our members were alarmed that something so big” would come straight to the Senate floor, the senator said, noting that the legislation had not been marked up by the Senate Finance Committee.

A group of Senate conservatives led by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) are demanding Social Security reforms, such as gradually raising the retirement age, to offset the cost of repealing two policies that reduce Social Security benefits for public-sector workers.

Paul says the bill, which has 14 Senate Republican co-sponsors, would lead Social Security to become insolvent more quickly.

“It speeds the bankruptcy of Social Security. Social Security is due to go bankrupt in 2034. This will speed it up by a year or so. It’s $200 billion added to a program that is already short of money,” he told The Hill.

He wants senators to vote on an amendment to offset the bill’s impact on the Social Security trust fund by gradually raising the retirement age to 70.

“If you’re going to add to its mandate by expanding it, you should pay for it,” he said. “One of the proposals that’s been out there for a long time is to gradually raise the age of eligibility.

“I’ll propose that as an amendment. ... If we raise the age [of retirement] gradually, about three months a year for the next 12 years, the age will go to 70 and then be linked to longevity. That would pay for this expansion,” Paul said.

“I won’t vote to support expanding [Social Security benefits] without paying for it,” he said.

“There are several other people opposed to this bill, too. So it may be that the others simply just want to delay it as long as possible in hopes that they will not be able to complete it this week,” he said.

The bipartisan bill, the Social Security Fairness Act, passed the House earlier this month by a vote of 327 to 75.

Paul’s demand to vote on an amendment to the bill to raise the Social Security retirement age puts Republican senators in a tough spot because many of them won’t want to touch the issue.

President-elect Trump told NBC’s “Meet the Press” in a recent interview he’s “not touching” Social Security other than to make it more efficient, opposing raising the age to receive benefits.

“The people are going to get what they’re getting,” he said.

Paul has leverage because he can drag out the floor debate on the bill for days if he doesn’t get a vote on his amendment. That would in turn delay the Senate’s consideration of a stopgap funding bill that needs to pass by the end of the day Friday to avoid a government shutdown.

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said the issue was debated intensely at the weekly Tuesday Republican policy lunch.

“There was a lot of conversation around [it] today,” Thune said, referring to proposals to raise the retirement age or find other ways to soften the impact on Social Security’s finances.

He described the debate at the Senate lunch as a “fulsome conversation.”

But the split in the GOP conference is so pronounced that Thune isn’t taking sides, instead letting his colleagues vote their conscience.

“I think in the end, it’s going to come down to individual members are going to make their own decisions,” he said.

“Obviously, I’m concerned about the long-term solvency of Social Security and that’s an issue that I think we need to address,” he added.

The legislation, sponsored by Sens. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), would repeal the Windfall Elimination Provision, which was enacted in 1983, and the Government Pension Offset, enacted in 1977, to allow public-sector workers to receive their full Social Security benefits.

The Windfall Elimination Provision, known as WEP, reduces the Social Security benefits of workers who receive pensions from a federal, state or local government for employment not covered by Social Security.

The Government Pension Offset, known as GPO, reduces Social Security spousal benefits for the spouses, widows and widowers whose spouses receive government pensions.

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), a prominent conservative, expressed alarm at the prospect of further draining the Social Security trust fund for a short-term political payoff.

“It’s got to be offset one way or another. We have never in history, to my knowledge, unleashed such a massive bomb that would blow such a massive hole in the Social Security trust fund — $200 billion,” he said.

“I understand the need to address some inequities that have arisen in this area. I don’t think there’s any member of our conference who doesn’t think that we need to do some repair, but I think we’re kidding ourselves and mistreating the American people if we blow a $200 billion hole in it and give no thought as how to fix that,” Lee said.

The Congressional Budget Office projected in September the bill would add $196 billion to the deficit over the next decade.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) told The Hill that conservatives are pushing hard to sink the bill.

“Hopefully it gets defeated,” he said.

“I think a lot of people who co-sponsored it … [did so] because there are people in their state who are impacted by it. Their assumption always was that it was going to be paid for,” he said.

“It’s way too broad. It provides benefits to people who aren’t harmed by the fix from the 1970s,” he said, referring to the Government Pension Act.

“I would view it as grotesquely irresponsible,” he said.

Johnson said Sen. Mike Crapo (Idaho), the top-ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, has complained that the bill did not even go through his committee, which has jurisdiction over Social Security.

The Republican co-sponsors include Sens. Mike Braun (Ind.), Deb Fischer (Neb.), Pete Ricketts (Neb.), Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Markwayne Mullin (Okla.), John Boozman (Ark.), Rick Scott (Fla.), Jerry Moran (Kan.) and John Kennedy (La.) and Vice President-elect JD Vance (Ohio).

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