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When Veronica Sanchez called the Social Security Hotline Thursday, she waited two hours for the phone to suddenly disconnect.
On Friday, she was on hold for six hours, but still didn’t pass to anyone.
“I have to take time out of work and take time to line up and work out this,” said the 52-year-old medical practice manager at Kanoga Park.
For Sanchez, the interest is high. If she does not obtain medical books from her agency by April 15th, parents carrying bonds risk losing about $2,500 a month in medical care. They would no longer receive insulin medication due to diabetes, she said, and could lose daily visits from nurses.
But even if Sanchez appears in person, she will not talk to her agent. The field office no longer accepts walk-in appointments.
“System, it’s broken,” Sanchez said.
After the Trump administration imposed a drastic overhaul of its social security management system, seniors, disabled people, and those who care for them have come across the knot of bureaucratic hurdles and service disruptions.
The California field offices are not closed. But many seniors have been crashing web pages, enduring clogged phone lines and turning their backs in their offices, causing frustration in Southern California and countries. Social Security officials have downplayed the issue, saying some of the issues that the Trump administration and government efficiency are led by Elon Musk.
In February, the agency that sends monthly checks to nearly 73 million Americans announced plans to cut 7,000 jobs and consolidate local offices from 10 to 4 as part of its efforts to “reduce the size of the bloated workforce and organizational structure.” The cuts implemented by the mask advisory team known as government efficiency represent a 12% reduction in the agency’s workforce.
Sanchez doesn’t believe she is enjoying the benefits of government efficiency.
“That’s frustrating,” she said.
If Sanchez didn’t reach someone from Social Security this week, she was worried that her parents, especially her mother, who suffered from rheumatic arthritis, would struggle to hold a coffee cup.
“If you don’t have a caregiver who will come to monitor your sugar in the morning, take a blood pressure reading…” she said.
Last week, a coalition of advocacy groups, including American Assn. Among the people with disabilities, they filed federal lawsuits against the Social Security Agency, deputy Leland Dudek and Musk. The agency overhauled its services “severely weakened” and claimed it “caused serious and irreparable harm.”
“In just nine weeks, the new administration overturned agencies by wiping down policy changes and destabilizing them. It turned key institutional functions into overloaded local offices, reduced phone-based services, and weakened the agency’s ability to meet the needs of its beneficiaries.”
“As a result, the core functionality of the SSA will be systematically dismantled, leaving millions of beneficiaries without the significant benefits that are legally entitled,” the lawsuit adds. “The defendant waived his obligations and placed an ideology around obligations and governance against his rulers.”
Maria Town, president and chief executive officer of the American Association. Of those with disabilities, changes to the system aren’t just harming the ability of people to sign up and register for people’s benefits, she told The Times. People who were already connected to systems that needed support were also struggling with decisions to benefit and access to health services.
“You can’t take someone over the phone,” she said.
Even before Trump took office, he said the town had a challenge with the system. Approximately 30,000 people with disabilities died in 2023, waiting for their SSDI applications to be approved.
“This only makes life difficult for millions of Americans,” she said. “Americans with disabilities want the government to be efficient and responsible for the needs of people. These reductions actually go against that goal despite their claims.”
The Social Security Administration did not respond to Times’ request for comment on issues in which elderly people and disabled people reported access to services. The agency’s press admitted in a series of X’s posts that the phone waited too long and the website faced challenges, but said the issue was “before its current administration.”
“We’ve let go of Zero Representatives for Customers,” the agency said, “We have continued to serve the public by moving our employees out of unmixed and important positions and strengthening the ranks of our existing dedicated frontline employees.”
The restructuring “focuses on mission-critical services without compromising the quality of services,” the agency said, “consistent with the demands of Americans for efficiency in government operations.”
But people across Los Angeles were avoided who appeared in the Social Security Field Office without an appointment.
Andrew Taylor, 55, threw his hand into the air Monday morning when he left the Social Security Agency on Wilshire Boulevard.
“Everything’s booked now,” a federal employee told a few people lined up on the sidewalk.
Taylor, a homeless and living in Skid Row, was lined up just before the door opened at 9am, so he wanted to get a letter of awards that allowed him to apply for food stamps and other benefits, but he was told he had to wait three hours.
“That’s ridiculous,” Taylor said. “They said they had to mail it to me, but there’s nothing I can do today.”
About five months ago, Taylor said he had asked for the same letter in the same office and had not encountered any problems. He didn’t know what to do with the difference and did not follow the changes in the White House.
“If this is what they’re doing in Washington, that’s not fair to anyone else,” he said. “The poor seem to always do the worst.”
Several other people waited in line, including 68-year-old Camila Sosa. She had not received a letter from Social Security that needed to be allowed to open a new bank account, so she could not get a direct answer as to why.
An agency employee told her that if she hadn’t booked she would have to wait three hours.
“Yeah, that’s so long,” she said in Spanish. She decided to leave another day and try again.
Social Security employees were equipped with telephone numbers and QR codes and were able to scan with telephone numbers and phones to make reservations. However, the website continued to reply with error messages.
Senior supporters say the challenges to access social security aid worsened in March when the Trump administration announced a new online verification procedure that would allow many seniors and Americans with disabilities to use their individual “My Social Security” accounts.
“This system is a hellish scene,” says Gevorg Adjian, founder of the Los Angeles nonprofit All Seniors Foundation, providing free healthcare, supply and health services for the elderly.
After sending a letter last month urging people with problems with the online system, Adjian said the administration has eliminated all sorts of walk-in bookings.
The amendment said he submitted a call from an elderly person who lost or had not received the check.
“They don’t have anyone to reach out to find that status. The appointments are three, four or five months,” Adjian said. “In Social Security income, you can’t wait three or four months and you won’t pay.”
Adjian said his foundation will help seniors get the online logins they need. However, uploading their IDs could be a challenge, he said, as most of them don’t use smart devices or have no emails.
“It separates older people from communication with the Social Security Administration,” he said of overhauling the system.
In addition to complications, the agency had cut out paper checks. This is dependent on many older people who don’t trust online trading.
Dr. Stephen Kearney, a Los Angeles emergency medical doctor who is receiving social security, said that harming many older people who are not familiar with computers is expected to change.
“Everyone agrees that there is excess and waste in government in every country,” he said. “But you don’t have surgery on a cleft flesh.”
At the Los Angeles Social Security Office on Crenshaw Boulevard, security guards allowed no one inside the building on Monday without a reservation.
A woman leaning against the walker approached the door after she escaped from Uber. She said she had a reservation.
The security guard looked at her papers and said that her appointment was for a phone call and someone from the agency was planning to call her.
She laughed loudly and said, “Let me in.”
The security guard directed her to the phone number on the flyer posted on the door and said she could try to get more information from that number.
“There’s nothing here right now,” the guard said.
Her caretaker returned her to the parking lot and called for another ride-share driver.
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