It doesn’t sound like they are referring to newborns needing to be physically present to get a SSN. Instead, it seems to refer to persons who are registering to start receiving their Social Security benefits (or existing recipients who want to change their direct deposit information). Also, there is an existing supported method for identifying yourself electronically that is mentioned in the article. In that sense, the headline seems a bit misleading.
tzs|11 months ago
Correct. They already tried to take care of that two weeks ago.
Since 1988, through a program called Enumeration at Birth (EAB), as part of their state's birth registration process (typically done at the hospital when the baby is born) allowed the parents to request Social Security registration. The state would then automatically send the information to the Social Security Administration (SSA) for processing.
Last week the acting SSA director ordered EAB cancelled in Maine, so parents would have to go to an SSA office to register their newborn [1][2][3]. The DOGE website showed that EAB was cancelled in Arizona, Maryland, Michigan, New Mexico, and Rhode Island (but did not list Maine).
There was enough objection to this that they then reversed the cancellation in Maine. The acting director said
> I recently directed Social Security employees to end two contracts which affected the good people of the state of Maine. The two contracts are Enumeration at Birth (EAB), which helps new parents quickly request a Social Security number and card for their newborn before leaving the hospital, and Electronic Death Registry (EDR) which shares recorded deaths with Social Security. In retrospect, I realize that ending these contracts created an undue burden on the people of Maine, which was not the intent. For that, I apologize and have directed that both contracts be immediately reinstated
He also said that EAB and EDR remain in place for every state.
As far as I know there was no explanation given on why specifically Maine, or on why those 5 other states were on the DOGE site.
[1] https://apnews.com/article/maine-trump-doge-social-security-...
[2] https://www.nbcwashington.com/investigations/social-security...
[3] https://www.pressherald.com/2025/03/06/social-security-start...