KC seniors on Social Security brace for Trump changes: ‘You better not touch my check’
Lucy Santoyo’s a Republican and Angela Esteban is a Democrat – a difference the two friends like to tease each other about.
They’re both concerned about Social Security.
Santoyo, 64, receives Social Security disability payments after she stopped working her food industry job several years ago following a cancer diagnosis. Esteban, a 72-year-old retired Jackson County employee, depends on her monthly benefits to financially survive.
The two friends have watched with apprehension as President Donald Trump’s administration has raced to remake the Social Security Administration. The agency plans to tighten identity verification procedures that will require many benefit recipients to make trips to local field offices or log into online accounts.
The Social Security Administration, which employs thousands in Kansas City, also plans to cut thousands of jobs nationwide and implement a sweeping reorganization. Current and former employees warn the Trump administration is pushing the agency to a breaking point that will place timely delivery of benefits at risk.
“My husband’s saying they’re going to go online. Now, that’s scary,” Santoyo said. “Because a lot of people, us elderly, I can barely do a computer myself.”
“I have a computer but it don’t work,” Esteban added.
The Star interviewed Santoyo and Esteban and heard from other seniors, along with those who provide elder services, to better understand how Kansas City-area seniors are grappling with anticipated changes to Social Security and what it would mean for their lives. What emerged was a portrait of widespread concern, and in some cases outright fear, about what’s ahead.
Santoyo, Esteban – and countless other seniors across the metro – rely on Social Security benefits. In many instances, the monthly benefits provide a financial foundation that keeps individuals out of destitution.
“You better not touch my check because I depend on it,” Esteban said. Her monthly income is less than $2,000, and over half of it comes from Social Security. “I don’t own a house. Rent, gas, light, water and my Spectrum and my medications. If it cuts me, I’ll be homeless.”
Santoyo called Social Security “our bread and butter.” She lives with her 69-year-old husband, who still works, a daughter and her brother.
“If I didn’t have that, I don’t know what we would do. I really don’t,” Santoyo said. “God, we would live probably on his paycheck to paycheck to paycheck, if we can make it that far.”
Social Security backtracks?
Santoyo and Esteban spend many weekday mornings at the Don Bosco Senior Center in Kansas City’s Columbus Park neighborhood.
When The Star spoke with them on Thursday, they had just finished yoga at the center. Among other reasons, they come for the food (the center serves a hot meal each day; it was beef stew on Thursday) and to socialize.
After news – and rumors – about Social Security began to swirl in January, Anne Miller, the center’s director, stood up during a meal and sought to reassure those present. She promised that the center would move quickly to keep seniors informed if something critical happened.
“Just everyone calm down, calm down,” Miller said, recounting her message at the time. “The sky is not falling. Not yet. We hope.”
On Wednesday, the Social Security Administration announced it was delaying until April 14 some of the changes it had planned to roll out next week.
Beginning in mid-April, the agency will require individuals to visit field offices to change their direct deposit information if they can’t use their online account. Changes will no longer be allowed over the phone, part of an effort to enhance identity verification, the agency says.
SSA also carved out some of the services from the enhanced verification that it had previously said would require online use or in-person visits. Individuals applying for Social Security disability benefits, Medicare or Supplemental Security Income can complete their claims over the phone if they cannot use an online account.
Still, individuals who can’t use an online account will need to visit a field office to apply for retirement, survivors and auxiliary benefits.
“We have listened to our customers, Congress, advocates, and others, and we are updating our policy to provide better customer service to the country’s most vulnerable populations,” Lee Dudek, the Social Security acting commissioner, said in a statement.
But policy changes that send more seniors to field offices threaten to further strain the Social Security system. Already, individuals who need to visit an office are urged to make an appointment.
Advocates for seniors worry more visits will increase the wait time for appointments, creating backlogs. They acknowledge that calling Social Security also comes with lengthy holds, but emphasized that it’s possible to take care of an issue over the phone in a single day.
“If we do away with the telephone service, that really is going to adversely affect a lot of people,” said Karen Weber, an elder law attorney in Overland Park who sits on the board of Kansas Advocates for Better Care, which promotes the interests of long-term care residents.
Caregivers will also bear the consequences of any Social Security changes, said Rachel Hiles, founder and board president of Sandwiched KC, a nonprofit that supports area caregivers.
Many caregivers already find themselves cutting into work or taking time off to transport those they care for to doctor visits and other appointments. More visits to Social Security offices would only exacerbate that burden, she said.
At the same time, helping older adults navigate computers and the internet can also be challenging.
“Do I want to miss work so I can take my loved one to the Social Security office, and who knows how long that would take. Or do I want to struggle with them at the computer, which honestly, I don’t know if that would be easier or not,” Hiles said.
For Esteban, who doesn’t drive, Santoyo is often “her bus ride,” offering transportation when she needs it.
The actual bus ride to her Social Security field office takes two buses, Esteban said. When she first retired, she had to visit the office multiple times, with paperwork in tow, to sort out her benefits.
“It was a bad hassle,” Esteban said.
Social Security recipients in the Kansas City area and those who work with them are “terrified and dejected,” said Janet Baker, executive director of KC Shepherd’s Center, a nonprofit that aids older adults.
Homebound individuals will be especially affected by reduced Social Security phone service. Some 850 people receive Meals on Wheels through KC Shepherd’s Center, she said, adding that they are homebound by the program’s definition. They physically can’t travel to field offices or stand in long lines, she said.
Advocates and others who work with seniors are trying to prepare for what’s coming even though the changes haven’t gone into effect yet.
“I think we are just ahead of beginning to hear from people who are in crisis because there is nothing that has changed as of yet,” Baker said.
‘We’ve done our time’
Even as the Social Security Administration cuts back on phone service, the bigger fear among Trump administration critics is that the agency’s actual mission – and its bedrock of reliability – has been called into question.
Last week, Dudek briefly threatened to shut down the agency over a court ruling that blocked billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative from accessing sensitive taxpayer data. Dudek backed down after the judge who issued the ruling called the acting commissioner’s claims inaccurate.
Musk has also called Social Security a “Ponzi scheme” and Trump has claimed Social Security is full of fraud, with his administration falsely claiming millions of dead people receive benefits. Experts say Trump and his allies are misrepresenting agency data to arrive at incorrect conclusions.
“Elon Musk, for sure, is not thinking about what happens when he turns 62 and is not thinking about Social Security and is not thinking about Medicaid,” said Rep. Sharice Davids, a Democrat who represents much of the Kansas side of the Kansas City metro.
“And I think that’s part of why it’s so irresponsible and outrageous to be calling it a Ponzi scheme, to be talking about it in a way that is just completely ignorant of the fact that people have been paying into the system their entire lives.”
Santoyo warned against making any cuts to Social Security. Older adults have worked for years and years, she said, paying into the system.
“How are we going to get our pay?” Santoyo said. “We’ve done our time.”
Money is tight in her household and every dollar matters. If the Social Security Administration doesn’t deliver benefits on time – or she misses a check because of a paperwork problem – it would cause immediate financial problems.
Unless the household definitely needs something, they try to go without, Santoyo said. They used to eat out all the time; now, maybe they go once a month. A restaurant bill for all of them together can run $100.
“I mean, my God,” Santoyo said. “And that’s with no drinks. My husband likes beer but I always say, ‘we go out … you don’t drink.’ Water, that’s all you’re going to get.”
Santoyo said Trump had promised during the campaign not to touch Social Security. She believes significant waste and fraud exists within the federal government and said she supports Trump cleaning up corruption in government – but wants Social Security unharmed.
“I didn’t think he would touch our Social Security because that was one of his campaign” promises, she said. “He was not going to touch Social Security, he was going to lower the gas bill.”
Not surprisingly, Esteban had a different perspective. “I don’t like the president, don’t like Elon, so I don’t hardly see the news,” she said.
Both hope Social Security, ultimately, won’t be harmed.
“I think people will say ‘no.’ And I’m pretty sure, hopefully, the president will hear us yelling, ‘listen to our needs’ for the elder,” Santoyo said. “Because to me, we’ve done our time. We should get what we deserve.”
This story was originally published March 28, 2025 at 5:30 AM.
