White House Split Over Social Security Reform

While Republicans take President Barack Obama to task for failing to provide leadership on Social Security reform, his economic and political aides are in conflict over what to do, The Hill reports.

The economic team, including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, National Economic Council Director Gene Sperling and Sperling’s deputy, Jason Furman, want benefit cuts on the table. But the political advisers, led by David Axelrod, David Plouffe and Jim Messina, worry that any benefit cuts could torpedo Obama’s re-election campaign.

The political aides are winning out so far, but the pressure from Republicans, who point out that Social Security must be reformed to truly attack the crushing debt burden, is being felt.

“One camp wants to be able to throw a bone to Republicans and some [centrist] Democrats.

The political people would prefer not to be accused of being the party that cuts Social Security in those ways,” a Democratic source tells The Hill.