Social Media will be monitored by Trump Administration to catch Disability Fraud

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The Trump administration proposed a rule that would grant agency officials to snoop on the social media accounts of Social Security disability recipients. The New York Times reported that the White House is currently working with the Social Security Administration to present a new rule to allow social media monitoring in order to crack down on fraud. The White House released a fiscal 2020 budget proposal on Monday. It would allow the Social Security Administration to use all collection tools to recover funds in certain scenarios as well as hold fraud investigators liable for overpayments.

The Right-wing think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Republican Party have long attacked the disability benefits program as being wasteful and rife with abuse. But the number of disability beneficiaries is actually plunging due to a stronger economy. Roughly 9.2 million Americans received disability benefits in 2017. People who collect disability benefits, known as Social Security Disability Insurance, receive monthly payments after not being able to work for a year or more due to a disability.

Families of deceased beneficiaries are also eligible for these payments in some cases. The agency website has indicated that the disability must limit the recipient’s ability to do basic work such as lifting, standing, walking, sitting, and remembering for at least 12 months. Republicans love the Trump administration proposal, disability rights advocates are worried that Facebook photos could be an inaccurate barometer of a person’s current physical state.

The chairwoman of the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities, Lisa D. Ekman informed the Times, “Just because someone posted a photograph of them golfing or going fishing in February of 2019 does not mean that the activity occurred in 2019”. People’s Facebook and Twitter has been a popular strategy throughout Trump’s time in office. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, under the Department of Homeland Security, has ramped up social media surveillance of both Americans and foreign visitors. The U.S Border Patrol was found to be compiling a database of journalists, activists, and other social media influencers involved in work related to the migrant caravan.