Trump Administration Forces Maine Parents To Visit Social Security Offices To Register Newborns
Story by Arthur Delaney, Huff Post, 3/7/25
For decades, new parents across the United States have been able to check a box on hospital forms in order to request Social Security numbers for their newborns.
That’s no longer the case in Maine, where parents will have to visit a Social Security field office thanks to a shocking move by President Donald Trump’s administration.
A spokesperson for the Maine Department of Health and Human Services told HuffPost on Thursday that the Social Security Administration said it had canceled two contracts with Maine’s vital statistics program that support Social Security’s electronic enumeration at birth program.
“As a result of SSA’s contract termination, effective immediately, Maine hospitals are no longer able to enroll newborns into Social Security at the time of birth so parents will now need to visit their local Social Security office to apply in-person for their child’s Social Security Number,” the Maine DHHS spokesperson said in an email.
It’s not clear if parents can go themselves on behalf of their newborns or if they’ll have to bring their babies to the offices, too. There are eight Social Security field offices in Maine.
No justification has been given for the change, which was first reported by the Portland Press Herald. The Social Security Administration and the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment from HuffPost.
The Social Security Administration rolled out enumeration at birth in the late 1980s, allowing parents only to check a box on state birth forms at the hospital to get their newborn a Social Security number. The program has been available in all 50 states since 1997, and 99% of people now get their Social Security numbers that way, according to the Social Security Administration.
Since taking office in January, Trump has empowered Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, to try to slash federal bureaucracies and fire workers. Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” has also targeted government contracts that Musk has described as wasteful.
It’s not clear if Musk’s young DOGE deputies thought the SSA contracts with Maine’s government were wasteful, or if they were canceled by accident, or if the change is political payback after Maine’s governor refused to play along with Trump’s directive to disallow transgender athletes in girls’ sports.
Maine Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, told Trump she would “see you in court” over the girls’ sports directive during a recent meeting between governors and the president in Washington, D.C. Trump then threatened to withhold all federal funding from Maine.