One of the funding elements of the Senate's six year transportation bill is a $2.9 billion pay-for from the Social Security Trust Fund.
The plan is to prevent felons with existing warrants to be prevented from receiving their Social Security benefit and instead put this money into the general fund as a pay-for for the transportation bill.
An example of a felon with an existing warrant receiving Social Security benefits is a senior who is wanted in the US for a felony, but lives in Costa Rica which does not allow extradition to the US.
Under current law they still receive their Social Security checks.
Whether or not it is a good idea to stop giving these felons their checks is not the issue here. I can see why we wouldn't want to assist criminals by giving them money and I can see that a citizen's benefit should not be touched and taking Social Security from one group of beneficiaries is a slippery slope.
However that is not what is important here.
If the senate figures out a way to not disburse Social Security funds, those saved funds should be kept inside the Social Security system and NOT used for fixing bridges.
WTF are they thinking??!!??