The nomination heads to the Senate for floor votes.
On April 2, the Senate Finance Committee proceeded with the appointment of Frank Vignano as administrator of the Social Security Agency (SSA).
“Mr. Bisignano has over 30 years of strong executive leadership experience and knows how to enact his bold vision of providing superior customer service to social security beneficiaries,” said committee chair Mike Krapo (R-Idaho) in a statement.
At the Bisignano hearing on March 25th, points of competition included the privatization of Social Security and the Ministry of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Bignanano said he never thought “we are privatizing and saying social security.”
Sen. Ron Wyden (R-ore.), a ranking member of the committee, criticized Doge’s presence at the agency.
“Now is the time for Social Security doge to bring a halt before it goes,” he said.
“Through these developments, the Doge crowd is breaking its sacred promise to provide Americans with earned social security benefits. It’s time for all members of this committee to step up, rewind these tragic actions and to regain legitimacy in Social Security.”
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Wyden claimed that during his nomination and his appointment hearing, Visignano was seeking the appointment of Doge staff at the SSA and had obtained “frequent briefings.” Wyden said the agency’s former employee was behind the allegations denied by Vignano.
During the hearing, Bisignano was asked about the protection of Social Security Beneficiaries’ personal data as Doge has access to the SSA’s personal database.
“I don’t know what “rock dagger” means because I’m going to do whatever it takes to protect information that is personal, but there’s more than a Doge that I can’t access that information,” he said as an administrator, in response to asking if I’d like to ask “rock dagger” in the agency’s database.
Doge argues that SSA is full of problems, including explanations for people of ages that are unthinkable.
Doge can flag issues only and cannot take any administrative action.
Federal judges temporarily prohibit Doge from accessing the SSA’s database containing American personal information.
“The Doge team is basically engaged in fishing expeditions at SSA, seeking more fraud than suspected outbreaks,” wrote Judge Ellen Hollander of the US District Court for the Maryland District.
“It’s certainly in the public interest to eradicate the possibility of fraud, waste and management in SSAs. But that doesn’t mean that the government can underestimate the law to do so.”
Additionally, Bisignano pledged to ensure that Social Security recipients get their checks on time and get timely customer support due to long wait times.
Bisignano was previously CEO of Fiserv, a financial technology company.
