The Trump administration is making false claims about millions of dead centenarians receiving Social Security payments, ABC News reported.

President Donald Trump and adviser Elon Musk have recently stated that people aged 100, 200, and even 300 years old are improperly receiving benefits, calling it a “HUGE problem.”

While improper payments have occurred, including some to deceased individuals, the numbers cited by Trump and Musk misrepresent Social Security data, ABC News reports.

Inspector General’s Report Reveals Low Improper Payment Rate

A July 2024 report from Social Security’s inspector general revealed that from 2015 to 2022, less than 1% of the $8.6 trillion in benefits paid out were improper payments. Most of these were overpayments to living individuals.

The confusion partly stems from the Social Security Administration’s outdated COBOL software system, which defaults to a reference point over 150 years ago for entries with missing or incomplete birthdates.

Additionally, the agency’s database includes about 18.9 million Social Security numbers of people born in 1920 or earlier not marked as deceased, but this doesn’t mean they’re receiving benefits.

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Experts Weigh In on Social Security’s Error Rate

Chuck Blahous, a senior research strategist at George Mason University, stated, “Social Security would be near the bottom of the list, not near the top” for error rates in federal government payments.

Sita Nataraj Slavov, a public policy professor at George Mason University, warned that these claims might mislead people into thinking there’s an easy fix for Social Security’s financial problems. “This is simply not true,” she said.

The White House spokesperson, Karoline Leavitt, referred to the inspector general’s report, stating, “The Social Security Administration is now working to find even more waste, fraud, and abuse in the Administration’s whole-of-government effort to protect American taxpayers.”

Read more at ABC News.