Mitch Perry
An advocacy group that supports maintaining Social Security as is say they intend to spend more than “six-figures” in Florida and four other battleground states this fall badgering GOP senators who have supported the concept of privatizing the program or cutting benefits to the popular program in recent years.
Brad Woodhouse, president with Americans United for Change, said on Tuesday his group will be hiring consultants in Florida, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Nevada to carry out several rounds of on-the-ground press events in the weeks to follow, including having local officials holding press conferences outside the offices of Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and other GOP Senate candidates, calling on them to sign a pledge vowing to protect Social Security from any budget cuts.
Regarding Rubio’s record on Social Security, Americans United for Change provided a link to reporters from a Rubio speech at the Reagan Library in 2011 that quotes him as saying programs like Social Security have “actually weakened us as a people.”
On a conference call on Tuesday, Public Policy Polling Director Tom Jensen quoted from a poll his firm recently conducted that showed strong opposition to privatizing Social Security and widespread opposition to supporting making any cuts to Social Security benefits.
The poll showed 88 percent of those surveyed said they oppose cutting benefits, while just five percent support that plan. Regarding privatization, a proposal that was last taken seriously when floated by George W. Bush in 2005, only 20 percent support the idea, with 66 percent opposed.
“You’d really have a pretty hard time finding anything that 88 percent of Americans can agree on, but cutting Social Security benefits and being opposed to that is something that just brings everyone together” said Jensen.
Only 14 percent of voters support changing the formula that increases benefits for inflation, while 62 percent oppose.
When informed about the possibility Republicans might pursue some of these policy changes if they end up with control of the White House, Senate, and House after the election, 53 percent of voters say that makes them less likely to vote for the GOP in November, to only 20 percent who say it makes them more likely to support the party’s candidates. Particularly notable is that among pivotal independent voters, 50 percent say possible Republican changes to Social Security would make them less likely to vote for the party compared to just 22 percent who would be more likely to do so.
“This really is an issue that could have a significant impact at the polls,” said Jensen.
PPP surveyed 856 registered voters in Florida, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin between Sept. 16 and 18 on behalf of Americans United for Change. The survey’s margin of error is +/- 3.4 percent.
As Jensen attested to during the conference call, Social Security hasn’t been discussed that often in the presidential campaign, or in the Florida Senate race between Rubio and Democrat Patrick Murphy that often.
As to whether Rubio is truly vulnerable on the issue of being soft on maintaining Social Security, PolitiFact recently weighed in on a super PAC ad supporting Murphy that claimed “Marco Rubio wanted to cut Social Security and Medicare because he said they’re bankrupting our country.”
The fact-checking journalism site ruled that charge “half-true.” The site claimed, “Rubio’s plan to raise the retirement age would amount to a cut for future Social Security recipients,” but added that “Social Security changes would not affect current retirees or people nearing retirement.”
Hillary Clinton has proposed removing the cap on taxes for earned income above $250,000. According to the Motley Fool website, she would maintain the current earnings tax cap of $118,500 to continue to increase with inflation on an annual basis, exempt earned income between the inflation-adjusted earnings tax cap and $250,000, and reinstitute the 12.4 percent tax on earned income above $250,000.
Donald Trump hasn’t been as specific, but has said that he would not cut any Social Security benefits.
