Leland Dudek, the acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration, outlined his vision for the agency in a lengthy memo to staff on Tuesday, detailing exploratory efforts to implement artificial intelligence and boost anti-fraud efforts as President Donald Trump and his right-hand adviser Elon Musk have zeroed in on claims of widespread improper payments at the bureau.
Before ascending to this position, Dudek previously worked at the agency’s anti-fraud office. The bureau opened an investigation into him after he was suspected of improperly sharing information with Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service; the Trump administration then placed him in charge of the agency.
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WATCH HEREIn the Tuesday memo, which was shared with NBC News by a person who obtained it, Dudek apologized for having made mistakes, said he will continue to make more and pledged to learn from them.
“Over the past month, this agency has seen an unprecedented level of media coverage, some of it true and deserved, while some has not been factual and painted the agency in a very negative light,” Dudek wrote. “I know this has been stressful for you and has caused disruption in your life. Personally, I have made some mistakes, which makes me human like you. I promise you this, I will continue to make mistakes, but I will learn from them. My decisions will always be with the best intentions for this agency, the people we serve, and you.”
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Dudek's remarks on making mistakes echoes Musk, who has said DOGE "will make mistakes" but that they will be fixed "very quickly."
Dudek praised employees as “outstanding,” saying the agency “hasn’t missed a beat” amid the heightened attention. He then laid out where he believes the agency has “made meaningful progress” in recent weeks.
He highlighted three specific points: Working to “prevent improper payments,” improving telephone services and processing submissions from employees who chose the voluntary separation program that the Trump administration promoted.
Dudek said 2,700 Social Security employees signed up for that program; 2,000 were deemed eligible, while more than 1,400 have signed their voluntary separation agreements.
On the other items, Dudek pointed to “expanded data-sharing agreements” with outside agencies as “a key step toward reducing fraud and waste. On telephone services, Dudek noted that the agency is “exploring ways to implement AI — in a safe, governed manner in accordance with” guidance from the Office of Management and Budget “to streamline and improve call resolution.”
The acting commissioner then outlined what he sees as the action plan for the agency over the next three months. Those items included a further zeroing-in on “fraud and waste,” as well as “optimizing and empowering” its workforce. On the latter, Dudek said the agency is “now in a good position to avoid reliance on involuntary reductions in our workforce for this fiscal year.”
Late last month, SSA said it plans to reduce its 57,000 workforce by 7,000 people.
Dudek said the Trump administration's "focus on detecting and eliminating fraud, waste and abuse is in line with our mission to pay the right person the right amount at the right time."
Additionally, Dudek said he “directed our leadership team to present real-time data online so that the public can see how we are doing.”
“I am increasing our anti-fraud efforts and leading with establishing state-of-the-art methods for identity proofing, which enables the public to securely interact with us online or over the phone,” he continued.
The Social Security Administration did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Dudek’s tenure has been marked so far by wide-ranging proposals and big shifts that have quickly been walked back. Earlier this month, the agency scrapped plans to end phone services for filing disability and retirement claims, as The Washington Post reported. Instead, the agency will move forward with a narrower plan that will no longer allow Americans to change their bank information with the agency over the phone.
Also this month, Dudek rescinded and apologized for an order that would have no longer allowed for parents in Maine to sign up for their newborns’ Social Security numbers at hospitals, instead having to register them at a federal office.
Michelle King, who previously served as the top official at the SSA, stepped down in February after she refused a request from the U.S. DOGE Service to access sensitive government records at the agency, NBC News previously reported.
That same month, Musk tweeted glowingly of Dudek.
"There ARE good people in the government who want to eliminate fraud & waste," Musk wrote. "Amazingly, Leland was fired by Social Security Administration upper management for helping @DOGE find taxpayer savings. Can you believe that?? Thanks to President Trump, Leland was brought back right away and now HE is upper management 😎 Promote good players, exit bad players. That’s the right thing to do."
Both Musk and Trump have heightened their focus on what they allege are improper payments flowing out of the agency. Democrats and critics have said this focus is merely a cover to cut Americans' earned benefits.
Notably, Musk has pledged that DOGE will be able to cut anywhere from $1 trillion to $2 trillion in federal spending — a number that would be virtually impossible to hit without touching entitlement spending. In an interview with NBC News in December, Trump said “we’re not touching“ Social Security when asked about proposed spending cuts.
In a spate of more recent interviews, Musk has referred to Social Security as "a Ponzi scheme," suggested it is paying out benefits to millions of dead Americans over 100 years old and is a vehicle for Democrats to make payments to undocumented immigrants. On Tuesday, the DOGE account on X tweeted that the Social Security Administration "has begun a major cleanup of their records."
"Approximately 3.2 million numberholders, all listed age 120+, have now been marked as deceased," DOGE tweeted. "More work still to be done."
During a joint speech to Congress, Trump joined in, claiming the administration was finding "shocking levels of incompetence and probable fraud in the Social Security program for our seniors."
Social Security is not fraudulently paying out benefits to millions of Americans age well beyond 100, as NBC News previously reported. Rather than fraud, the information Trump and Musk have pointed to as the basis of their claims amounted to a misreading of a known problem with the government's data. Though there are millions of people over age 100 in the SSA's database, the vast majority aren’t receiving benefits. The agency’s online records showed that fewer than 90,000 people over age 99 received retirement benefits in December.
A 2023 report from the SSA’s inspector general found that from 2015 to 2022, 0.84% of benefits payments were improper, totaling $71.8 billion over eight years. Most of those payments, the report said, were overpayments, not payments to deceased Americans or people who did not qualify for them. (In an interview on the podcast of Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, on Monday, Musk surmised that there was between $100 billion and $200 billion in entitlements fraud across federal benefit systems.)
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