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About six years ago, my niece’s husband was killed in a car accident on his way to work, leaving her a widow at 40 with three young children.  She was grief struck, but Social Security survivors benefits relieved her from the added anxiety of how to survive as a family and pay the bills.

In Minnesota, 1.12 million people receive Social Security benefits.  Like me, they paid in from their first job in their late teens through their last job in their 60’s or 70’s. We depend on these benefits to pay our bills, rent, mortgage, home owners’ insurance, as well as heat, light, and groceries. It is a promise and a contract with our government.  It is one of the most efficiently run agencies with just a 1.2% overhead (compared with 23% of some insurance companies,) and fraud is rare.

When our current president recently spent 15 minutes of his speech to a joint session of Congress railing against Social Security, when Elon Musk calls it a Ponzi scheme, and thousands of Social Security workers are fired and offices are closed, believe me, they are out to destroy it.  Martin O’Malley, the former head of Social Security, said that they are trying to destroy trust, run it in the ditch, and work to privatize it and invest it in the stock market.  Can you imagine checking the market each day to see if you can pay next month’s bills?

A younger friend of mine said is worried because she has even more to lose.  She said, like many people her age, she has no pension plan and will rely on Social Security as her only pension plan. 

And where is our congressman, Brad Finstad, our only voice in the US House?   Absent, not standing up for Social Security or his constituents.

So come join Freeborn and Mower county folks  to protect Social Security at a rally on Monday April 21 at 5 p.m. in Austin in front of the Social Security Office (404 2nd St NW). And don’t hesitate to call Congressman Finstad office (DC: 202-225-2472 or Roch 507-577-6140)

No one voted to take a wrecking ball to Social Security.  So regardless of your party, regardless of your age, come join us.

Mary Hinnenkamp

Albert Lea, MN