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In remarks to reporters at the White House on Wednesday, President Donald Trump admitted that he wanted to push for privatizing Social Security in his first term in office, contradicting campaign promises he made in 2016 and earlier that he wouldn’t touch the popular social safety net program.

“I wanted to ride with Social Security being fully invested in the stock market, in the first month of my first year, so 2016,” Trump said, errantly conflating the year he was elected to the year he was inaugurated.

Trump complained that he wasn’t able to do so due to “tremendous criticism from the Democrats and some Republicans.”

Trump: I wanted to ride with Social Security being fully invested in the stock market. But I was met with opposition from Democrats and Republicans. pic.twitter.com/wv15WCI7Ze— FactPost (@factpostnews) October 7, 2026

Trump: I wanted to ride with Social Security being fully invested in the stock market. But I was met with opposition from Democrats and Republicans. pic.twitter.com/wv15WCI7Ze

Trump then reiterated his desire to privatize the program. “I wanted to do it so badly,” he said.

Trump described so-called “Trump Accounts,” investment........

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