Senator Ted Cruz and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent have both described Trump’s proposed “Trump Accounts” as a back door to Social Security privatization. The structure of the accounts shows something different: They add to Social Security rather than carve money out of it. That distinction matters enormously. It determines whether the debate centers on a genuine policy opportunity or on a mischaracterization that echoes the failed privatization fight of 2005. Based on decades of research on retirement security, the key question is not what some hope these accounts might someday become, but what they are designed to do now.

Cruz recently dropped what he called a “dirty little secret” about Trump accounts at the Milken Institute Global Conference: “Conservatives in America, for 50 years… have been trying to do Social Security personal accounts. Here’s the dirty little secret: Trump Accounts are Social Security personal accounts.” Bessent similarly described Trump accounts as “a back door for privatizing Social Security” before he quickly walked it back.

Both characterizations mistake what the accounts do. The Trump accounts are not privatization. The distinction matters enormously, and getting it right matters for whether progressives engage constructively with a genuine opportunity or spend political capital fighting the wrong battle.

Bush Subtracted. Trump Adds.

Twenty years ago, President George W. Bush made Social Security privatization the centerpiece of his second-term domestic agenda. His proposal was a subtraction: Workers would divert up to 4% of their payroll taxes — money that flows directly into Social Security — into private investment accounts. Diverting that revenue would have drained the very funds that pay........

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