{"id":106065,"date":"2025-07-30T23:31:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-30T23:31:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/106065\/"},"modified":"2025-07-30T23:31:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T23:31:11","slug":"trump-accounts-a-backdoor-to-privatize-social-security-bessent-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/106065\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump accounts a ‘backdoor’ to privatize Social Security, Bessent says"},"content":{"rendered":"

“In a way, it is a backdoor way for privatizing Social Security,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said of new $1,000 accounts for newborns that passed in President Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill.”<\/p>\n

\"play\"<\/p>\n

How upcoming Medicaid cuts could harm children with disabilities<\/p>\n

Parents of children with disabilities say the Medicaid cuts in the \u201cOne Big Beautiful Bill\u201d will directly impact the well being of their kids.<\/p>\n

WASHINGTON \u2015 Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent<\/a> touted new savings accounts for American babies<\/a> included in President Donald Trump’s <\/a>recently approved megabill as a “backdoor for privatizing Social Security.”<\/p>\n

Bessent on July 30 hailed so-called “Trump accounts” for American newborns that passed in Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill”<\/a> as an innovative way to get more Americans to take part in the financial system, increase financial literacy and build their retirement savings.<\/p>\n

Under the program, American children born this year through 2028 are eligible for a one-time $1,000 contribution from the federal government per toddler into a mutual fund or index fund that is tied to the performance of the stock market.<\/p>\n

“In a way, it is a backdoor way for privatizing Social Security,” Bessent said, speaking at a policy event hosted by the conservative outlet Breitbart News. “Social Security is a defined benefit plan paid out \u2012 that to the extent that if all of a sudden these accounts grow, and you have in the hundreds of thousands of dollars for your retirement, that’s a game-changer.”<\/p>\n

‘Trump accounts’ for babies? <\/strong>Why the White House is pushing cash for kids<\/a><\/p>\n

Trump’s megabill \u2012 which the president signed into law on July 4 after it cleared Congress with only Republican support \u2012 extended Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, ended taxes on tips, allocated billions in border-wall funding and cut Medicaid and food stamp benefits, among other new policies<\/a> including the “Trump accounts.”<\/p>\n

The new law did not make changes to Social Security, which the president vowed to protect.<\/p>\n

Demcorats slammed Bessent’s comments. “Trump White House openly admits their plan to privatize Social Security,” U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle, D-Pennsylvania, said in a post on X<\/a>. “I will fight them with everything I got to keep their grubby little hands off it.”<\/p>\n

But Bessent, in a statement after his remarks<\/a>, said the “Trump accounts” will be an added benefit on top of Social Security, not a replacement to the program.<\/p>\n

“Trump Baby Accounts are an additive benefit for future generations, which will supplement the sanctity of Social Security\u2019s guaranteed payments,” the Treasury secretary said. “This is not an either-or question: our Administration is committed to protecting Social Security and to making sure seniors have more money.”<\/p>\n

Democrats have long accused Republicans of aiming to privatize Social Security, a New Deal era welfare program that provides benefits for seniors and Americans with disabilities.<\/p>\n

In 2005, President George W. Bush proposed a plan that would have allowed Americans to invest a portion of their Social Security tax payments into the stock market, but the overhaul failed to gain traction in Congress.<\/p>\n

The Trump baby accounts are expected to become available next July. Parents can also contribute up to $5,000 annually to the tax-deferred account to be invested in a diversified fund that tracks a U.S.-stock index. Qualified withdrawals, including for education expenses or credentials, a down payment on a first home or as capital to start a small business, are taxed at the long-term capital-gains rate.<\/p>\n

Big Beautiful Bill 101: <\/strong>What you need to know about the new law<\/a><\/p>\n

There are no income requirements and everyone is eligible, as long as the child is a U.S. citizen, and both parents have Social Security numbers. Money from “Trump accounts” can’t be withdrawn until the beneficiaries turn 18 years old.<\/p>\n

Bessent recounted recently talking to construction workers at a gas station who were purcashing $20 lottery tickets.<\/p>\n

“I was sitting there thinking \u2012 and I tell them \u2012 the best thing you could do is save that $20. Now with these (Trump) accounts, they can be part of the system,” Bessent said. “What if they had put that money in the S&P or in Bitcoin, or anything? We are making people part of the system. We are increasing financial literacy.”<\/p>\n

This article has been updated with additional information.<\/p>\n

Reach Joey Garrison on X @joeygarrison.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"“In a way, it is a backdoor way for privatizing Social Security,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said of…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":106066,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[5672,931,27385,16848,64,327,3853,10889,9124,3040,446,69,17174,25982,19277,3755,9106,635,68175,1539,10669,5678,255,80,7047,1054,700,5682,4995,3161,711,3566,9580,11186,8727,448,34462,277,27761,1439,31363,18246,646,67,132,68,68174],"class_list":{"0":"post-106065","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-administration","9":"tag-and","10":"tag-branch","11":"tag-bush","12":"tag-business","13":"tag-congress","14":"tag-deal","15":"tag-democratic","16":"tag-democratic-party","17":"tag-department","18":"tag-donald","19":"tag-donald-trump","20":"tag-executive","21":"tag-executive-branch","22":"tag-george","23":"tag-george-w-bush","24":"tag-market","25":"tag-new","26":"tag-new-deal","27":"tag-of","28":"tag-party","29":"tag-pension","30":"tag-personal-finance","31":"tag-politics","32":"tag-republican","33":"tag-republican-party","34":"tag-retirement","35":"tag-retirement-u0026-pension","36":"tag-security","37":"tag-social","38":"tag-social-security","39":"tag-social-security-administration","40":"tag-stock","41":"tag-stock-market-and-stocks","42":"tag-stocks","43":"tag-the","44":"tag-treasury","45":"tag-trump","46":"tag-twitter","47":"tag-u-s","48":"tag-u-s-congress","49":"tag-u-s-department-of-the-treasury","50":"tag-u0026","51":"tag-united-states","52":"tag-unitedstates","53":"tag-us","54":"tag-w"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}