Elon Musk pushed false claims about Social Security and Medicaid to justify his intention to cut those highly popular taxpayer entitlements, according to MSNBC's Joe Scarborough. And he added the tech mogul's intentions couldn't be more politically toxic.
Donald Trump's benefactor and adviser told Fox Business Network host Larry Kudlow that Democrats exploited federal entitlements to "attract and retain illegal immigrants" and then turn them into voters, which echoes the white nationalist "great replacement" theory, and the "Morning Joe" host blasted the billionaire's remarks.
"You know, there are times when Democrats have put words in Republicans' mouths about Social Security, Medicare," Scarborough said. "Here, he said the quiet part out loud and actually said Social Security and Medicare is where all the money is and those are the ones that need to be eliminated. Now we've, of course, seen him say other things that have been deeply damaging politically, but that is extraordinarily damaging politically."
"I want to do a fact check also," Scarborough added. "He wasn't talking about the, what, people up to 160 years of age that Donald Trump incorrectly said were getting Social Security payments. He's saying that's where the money is. By the way, you and I, we always say that. We don't say eliminate them. We also don't say that people are, you've got Democrats using Social Security and Medicare to attract illegal immigrants to America to vote for them. That's, I must say, that is a new and quaint approach to the two most important programs for Americans, retired Americans, but that's what he said."
The president stated in his address to Congress last week that nearly 16 million people over the age of 100 have been receiving Social Security payments, including 130,000 who are supposedly older than 160, and even “one person listed at 360" – but Scarborough said those claims were demonstrably untrue.
"In 2023, Social Security report found that only 44,000 Americans of the 18.9 million individuals listed over 100 years old in the database were receiving payments," Scarborough said. "In 2020's Census Bureau, there were 80,139 people in America who were over 100, so that tells you that there are almost twice as many Americans alive over 100 as there are Americans who are receiving Social Security payment checks.
"So the idea that there's this massive fraud is ridiculous – 80,000 Americans alive over 100 years of age, not, you know, and half of them not getting Social Security benefits. So, again, it undermines it. This is, again, this is a lie that Musk continued to tell yesterday, but also just overall talking about how those are the programs that need to be eliminated. Again, pretty shocking to most Americans, I would think."
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