An organization that uses the law to combat senior poverty is suing the Social Security Administration for wrongfully terminating and reducing Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits.
Justice in Aging recently issued a press release about the action. This group contends that Social Security wrongfully terminated or reduced benefits and failed to inform those impacted by Social Security’s move because the agency did not effectively inform beneficiaries of a simplified waiver process put in place on overpayment cases due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many people on SSI had their benefits terminated or reduced. Below is a portion of the press release that explains the lawsuit in further detail.
During the pandemic tens of thousands of people who rely on Supplemental Security Income (SSI) to survive have experienced harmful and sometimes life-threatening disruptions in their benefits. Many people’s benefits were reduced through no fault of their own. Instead, in addition to the many other barriers that the pandemic created, the Social Security Administration (SSA) stopped processing certain paperwork and closed all of its offices, making it impossible for many to provide information to, or effectively challenge the decisions of, the agency. Yesterday, the New York Legal Assistance Group, Justice in Aging, and the law firm Arnold & Porter filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of five SSI recipients challenging these unlawful practices.
This is not a surprising turn of events. Many times Social Security has programs or initiatives in place, but the public has no idea about them and the agency does not always do a good job of informing beneficiaries of their options, especially during the pandemic. Social Security offices have been closed to the public since March 2020. Since then, except for very special circumstances, this has required beneficiaries to communicate with Social Security by phone and the communication between Social Security and its beneficiaries has always been lacking.
