Honoring Older Americans

As a nation, we made a promise to our seniors: if you pay into the system, the services to which you contribute will be available to help you when you retire. I believe we have a moral obligation to keep this promise. And that system is working: today, almost two-thirds of seniors count on Social Security for most of their income and another one-third for the entirety of it. Equally fundamental to the financial protection of seniors is Medicare, which provides access to health care for 49 million Americans annually.

That's why we need to invest more in Social Security. I support a robust plan that would increase Social Security benefits by two percent, create a minimum benefit at twenty-five percent over the poverty line to ensure seniors have the resource they need to live with dignity, and increase inflation adjustments by using the national Consumer Price Index for the Elderly (CPI-E), which more accurately measures senior spending on essential items.

It is the job of Congress to ensure these benefits are sustainable and ready to support older Americans upon retirement. As your member of Congress, I will fight for those rights.