Former Social Security Commissioner (SSA) Martin O’Malley violated the Hatch Act during an interview with a local news outlet in North Carolina last year, a U.S. Office of Special Counsel (OSC) investigation found on Friday.
The office began the probe after a complaint was filed on Oct. 23, 2024, that alleged O’Malley, who at the time served as SSA’s commissioner, was in violation of the Hatch Act for “using his official authority to interfere with or affect the results of an election.”
The complaint pointed to O’Malley’s seven-minute interview with WPTF Morning News based in Raleigh, N.C.
Most of the interview was predicated on O’Malley’s work at the independent agency. For the last question, host Chris Edwards asked the SSA chief what was the “biggest thing” he wanted to leave to the listeners in the region about his work at the agency.
O’Malley said that Social Security is “here for the long haul” and that everyone has the responsibility to use their “power” to ensure the program is “strong for our kids and for our grandkids.”
The former Maryland governor then claimed he “certainly can’t tell anybody who to vote for, but I can tell you that the proposals that are coming from Donald Trump would quickly deplete Social Security and we wouldn’t be able to pass it on to our kids as our grandparents passed it on to us.”
“But to govern is to choose,” O’Malley told the host. “Everybody has a choice to make. And for our part, we want to serve the public and we want to secure the future of the men, women and children of the nation, including people of North Carolina.”
The office of special counsel wrote that the “only plausible conclusion to draw from Mr. O’Malley’s comments is that, while speaking in his capacity as SSA Commissioner, he explicitly told listeners that they must vote against President Trump to satisfy their responsibility to preserve Social Security.”
After the interview, O’Malley self-reported his comments to SSA’s ethics officials. He did not engage with OSC throughout the investigation. Since O’Malley left government service, he will not face disciplinary action. The OSC forwarded the findings of the probe to the White House.
“I hope that the Report can be used by your Administration to educate incoming officials to help ensure compliance with the Hatch Act,” wrote Charles N. Baldis, a senior counsel at OSC.
The Hatch Act prevents federal government employees from engaging in campaign activity in their official capacity.
The report is the first Hatch Act review issued since Trump removed Special Counsel Hampton Dellinger, the head of the office.
Dellinger sued to keep his post, arguing Trump violated the law by removing him after he was nominated under President Biden and confirmed to a five-year term by the Senate.
While lower court rulings initially kept him in his post, Dellinger abandoned his legal battle after a ruling from an appeals court determined he could not remain in the role amid the litigation.
Since then, the office has reversed course on some matters, including whether Trump has the power to carry out wide-scale firings of probationary employees hired by the federal government in the last year or two.
