Submitted by United States Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana
WASHINGTON (December 21, 2024) – The Senate has passed the Social Security Fairness Act, a bill that Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) cosponsored. The bill now heads to the president’s desk to be signed into law.
The Social Security Fairness Act repeals two provisions in the law that reduce the Social Security benefits for public servants and workers who receive certain pensions.
“In effect, two pieces of our law—the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset—have been penalizing public servants for working hard to earn their pensions. The good news is that the Senate just passed a bill called the Social Security Fairness Act, which I’ve been working to pass in the Senate since 2017. Our bill is going to make sure that Louisianians who receive a pension from their work in public service can collect their full Social Security benefits in retirement,” explained Kennedy.
The Windfall Elimination Provision cuts the Social Security benefits that retirees or disabled workers get if they ever worked in a job that contributed to a pension instead of Social Security. As a result, Louisianians who worked in public service for part of their careers see their Social Security benefits shrink compared to workers who spent their whole careers in the private sector.
The Government Pension Offset affects the public servants who worked in jobs that contributed to pensions instead of Social Security but are married to someone who paid into Social Security. The Government Pension Offset currently axes two-thirds—67%—of the value of that public servant’s pension from the Social Security spousal or survivor benefits that the public servant receives.
For example, if a widowed police officer receives a monthly civil service pension of $3,000, then two-thirds of that total payment—$2,000—would be deducted from the Social Security survivor benefits that he receives because his late wife paid into Social Security.
“I worked to kill these two unfair provisions back when I was state treasurer of Louisiana, and I’ve worked for seven years, almost eight years, as a U.S. Senator to get rid of them. Why? Because I wanted to make sure that Louisianians who received the pension from their work in public service could collect their full Social Security benefits in retirement—no tricky cuts that would hurt them and their families,” Kennedy said.
“Folks, these folks I’ve been talking about, they didn’t go into public service to get rich. We shouldn’t punish these good people for their public service by making them poorer—especially when some of my colleagues here in Washington have been obsessed— obsessed!—with giving taxpayer dollars to people who are in our country illegally,” he concluded.
Kennedy has cosponsored the Social Security Fairness Act in every Congress since he was elected to the Senate.
