Trump executive order ‘reckless war’ on US Social Security, Biden says

US President Donald Trump has been blamed for his “reckless war” on US Social Security after an executive order to cut payroll taxes.

“He is laying out his roadmap to cutting Social Security,” said Joe Biden, the president’s rival in the 2020 presidential election. “Our seniors and millions of Americans with disabilities are under enough stress without Trump putting their hard-earned Social Security benefits in doubt.”

Trump signed some executive orders Saturday from his private club in Bedminster, New Jersey, further vowing to make permanent payroll tax cuts if he is reelected in the upcoming race.

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The decision -- which also included extension of unemployment benefits, offering federal eviction and student loan relief -- has come under criticism, not just from the former vice president but also from other top Democrats such as House speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer.

“We’re disappointed that instead of putting in the work to solve Americans’ problems, the President instead chose to stay on his luxury golf course to announce unworkable, weak and narrow policy announcements to slash the unemployment benefits that millions desperately need and endanger seniors’ Social Security and Medicare,” Pelosi and Schumer said in a joint statement Saturday evening.

As the covid-19 pandemic keeps taking more lives in the United States, the top congressional Democrats asserted that  Trump, “still does not comprehend the seriousness or the urgency of the health and economic crises facing working families.”

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“Democrats repeat our call to Republicans to return to the table, meet us halfway and work together to deliver immediate relief to the American people,” the two lawmakers. “Lives are being lost, and time is of the essence.”

The criticism comes as the legality of Trump’s decision to unilaterally intervene on unemployment and other benefits is still under question.

Biden, in part, argued that the president’s latest decision, affecting Americans making less than roughly $100,000 annually, does not appear to include “protections or guarantees that the Social Security Trust Fund will be made whole.”

Pressure on the Republicans’ pick for the November race was also mounted by some GOP figures such as Senators Lindsey Graham and Ben Sasse.

“The pen-and-phone theory of executive lawmaking is unconstitutional slop,” Sasse said in a statement. “President [Barack] Obama did not have the power to unilaterally rewrite immigration law with DACA, and President Trump does not have the power to unilaterally rewrite the payroll tax law.”

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