On November 13, a small team of people with disabilities slipped through White House security and entered the narrow, busy hallways of the West Wing, not knowing what to expect. They successfully held a brief meeting with James Blair, one of President Donald Trump’s deputy chiefs of staff, in hopes of blocking the planned policy changes. In recent weeks, ProPublica and the Washington Post have reported that Social Security Administration officials are working on proposed regulations that could leave at least 830,000 mostly older, blue-collar workers unable to receive disability benefits.
The advocacy group, led by Jason Turkish, co-founder of the Social Security disability rights group Alliance for America’s Promise, sent the White House team the Oct. 31 ProPublica article and other materials. The report showed that if the Trump administration enacted this regulation, it would disproportionately harm some of the president’s most loyal supporters, especially coal miners, factory workers, and other manual laborers between the ages of 50 and 60 in West Virginia, Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Alabama. The government’s rationale for reducing the qualifications of these workers was that even if they were severely disabled, they should be able to find work in the modern economy doing more sedentary computer work or perhaps driving for Uber or DoorDash. Disability advocates countered that those who have worked in demanding fields for decades, some without high school education and who grew up before the digital age, would face severe obstacles to such a career change, including age discrimination in the hiring process, a lack of desk jobs in rural areas and the difficulty of learning skills that are unfamiliar to them at this point in their lives.
A few doors down from the Oval Office, Turk and his colleagues turned a corner and entered Prime Minister Blair’s office. Sitting across from him was a second person his supporters had not expected to encounter. He was Russell Vought, the White House’s powerful budget director. He looked dissatisfied.
After several minutes of conversation about disability regulations, Vought said, “I know what’s been written about this,” Turkisch and another person present said. However, he added that the rule change “is not going to happen.”
It was a surprising announcement from an often uncompromising official in an administration that has little history of changing its mind in response to pressure from journalism oversight or vulnerable advocacy groups. But that’s what Turkey and three other sources say: The Trump administration has decided not to move forward with the disability cuts it has been working on all year — and indeed since at least 2019, when officials in Trump’s first term were close to finalizing similar regulations.
Mr. Turkish, who is also president and managing partner of one of the nation’s largest law firms representing disability claimants and beneficiaries, said in an interview that Mr. Vought and Mr. Blair seem to have absorbed recent coverage of the issue. He said they recognize the anxiety experienced by disabled workers like Christopher Tincher, a former coal miner who lost his leg while working at a wastewater treatment plant in Arkansas and was featured in a ProPublica article. Turk and another official at the scene said both officials made it clear that restrictions would not proceed in any way.
Turkey’s point is that vulnerable Americans like Tincher are not being talked about enough in the West Wing. “It was extremely important to have senior White House staff read his story, to have them remember what this program is, to have them remember that Social Security Disability is not a partisan thing,” Turkish said.
The two then left together and walked back down the hallway, with Vaught walking in the same direction. According to one attendee, he didn’t say a word the whole time.
Spokespeople for the Social Security Administration and the White House Office of Management and Budget did not respond to ProPublica’s questions, including whether they dispute advocates’ claims that the planned regulations have been repealed. According to attendees, a senior Social Security Administration official confirmed at yesterday’s meeting that the regulations had indeed been suspended. It is unclear why government officials did not make this public, although they mentioned it at meetings, including one with supporters.
At the White House meeting, Blair told Turkey to go to Frank Bisignano, the head of the Social Security Administration, and “ask him point blank” whether the regulations would in fact be moved forward, according to two participants.
On Tuesday, Turkey said he did just that and met with Bisignano. The second meeting was also attended by longtime lobbyist Andrew Woods and Social Security Administration general counsel Mark Steffensen. Mr. Turkish and Mr. Woods said Mr. Bisignano asked what the White House had said about the disability issue, and that Mr. Bisignano also “categorically” acknowledged that the regulations could not move forward.
The secretary has made clear he is focused on modernizing the Social Security Administration, not cutting disability benefits, they said. “I take him at face value,” Turkish said, adding that Bisignano was not actively involved in the development or discussion of the regulations and may have decided not to push for them once they “reached his level.”
Turk and Woods said Bisignano directed them to tell the disability advocacy community that “there is no agreement between this office and the White House regarding not moving forward with this regulation.” On Monday, Mr. Bisignano himself should be able to tell them that he is considering participating in a town hall with advocates and people with disabilities.
Turkish told other supporters in a group email that the organization “remains vigilant to ensure these guarantees are honored.”
The regulations being drafted by the Trump administration, which remain published in the Federal Register due out in December, would make two major changes to the Social Security Administration’s disability system, according to four agency officials with knowledge of the plan. First, it would have updated the job postings that Social Security disability adjudicators use to determine whether there are jobs in the U.S. economy for manual workers despite physical disabilities. The proposed changes would update extremely outdated employment data and were the result of a bipartisan effort since the Obama administration.
The second provision was controversial. That would almost completely remove age from the criteria for these decisions, meaning disabled people over 50 would no longer be eligible for support in the same way as people in their 20s. This may have had side effects as well. Losing disability status would prevent such workers from accessing Medicare, which they currently qualify for at a younger age because of their disability. And if workers are increasingly denied benefits in their 50s, many will be forced to draw down their savings, which could lead to workers filing for Social Security retirement benefits early, which could reduce benefits for them and their spouses until they die.
A new poll by a pro-Trump firm suggests that older Trump supporters overwhelmingly oppose such changes to disability status. Two people familiar with the situation said the administration may have been particularly sensitive to such views, given the Democratic Party’s strong performance in recent elections. As one lobbyist put it, the key is to “take the issue and put it on the right table.”
