Central Louisiana News

U.S. Senators Bill Cassidy, Susan Collins, John Cornyn, and John Fetterman have requested that the Social Security Administration (SSA) grant full retroactive payments to those affected by the Government Pension Offset (GPO). The Social Security Fairness Act, enacted with Cassidy's involvement, permits these payments from January 2024, yet some spouses currently only receive retroactive aid going back six months.

"Over the past few weeks, several constituents have contacted our offices regarding the retroactivity of their spousal benefits under the Social Security Fairness Act," the senators stated. They highlighted that numerous spouses were advised by SSA that their spousal benefits would reduce to $0 due to the GPO, resulting in no applications being submitted. The senators argued, "We ask SSA to review the agency’s policy and grant maximum retroactivity payments to all spouses who were protected on prior applications and wrongly advised by employees of SSA not to apply for spousal benefits when they first inquired."

Cassidy emphasized the importance of this issue in a letter addressed to Acting Commissioner Dudek. In the letter, it was noted that the SSA policy suggests that if the spouse was protected on the worker's application and it wasn’t closed properly, it remains open indefinitely.

The statement comes after a significant number of Louisiana residents benefited from the Act. Earlier this year, it was declared that 73,000 individuals in the state had received over $566 million in retroactive payments. Cassidy has been a longstanding supporter since introducing the legislation in 2009.

The senators' request coincides with broader efforts to repeal the Windfall Elimination Provision and GPO, with Cassidy expressing these concerns on the U.S. Senate floor multiple times.

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