B. CHANGES IN LAW AND POLICY AFFECTING SOCIAL SECURITY SINCE THE 2022 REPORT Since the Trustees submitted the 2022 report to Congress, there have been no changes in law, policy, or regulation that are expected to have significant financial effects on the OASDI program. However, there have been a number of notable regulatory and judicial developments related to immigration policy. At the time of the 2022 report, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services had paused processing of first-time applications under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy but continued to process renewal applications. Since then, there have been several regulatory and judicial developments: • On August 30, 2022, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) published a final rule in the Federal Register, establishing regulations to “preserve and fortify” the DACA program in full. • On October 5, 2022, the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed an earlier district court decision that had declared the DACA policy unlawful. The appeals court returned the case to the district court for further review of the DHS regulation. • On October 14, 2022, the district court issued an order extending the pause in implementing the DACA final rule. As a result, DHS is currently prohibited from processing new DACA applications and related employment authorizations. Changes in DACA policy affect OASDI program operations because those who apply for and receive deferred action status are eligible for work authorization, which leads to additional workers covered by the OASDI program, increased payroll tax revenue, and subsequently increased benefit cost. The estimates presented in last year’s report reflected the assumption that the DACA program would be fully in effect by the middle of 2022, consistent with the Administration’s intent. Because of the court challenges, the estimates in this year’s report incorporate an additional one-year delay in the resumption of processing new applications, to the middle of 2023. This change is estimated to have negligible financial effects on the OASDI program over both the short-range and long-range projection periods. Sections IV.A.4 and IV.B.6 of this report provide further description of the magnitude of effects on the financial status of the OASDI program.
