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Social security benefits have now been extended to surviving same-sex spouses and partners thanks to two class-action lawsuits filed by the Lambda Legal civil rights organization. Previously, members of the LGBTQ community were deemed ineligible because of strict state laws preventing same-sex marriage.
This week, Lambda Legal won two victories on behalf of 65-year-old Michael Ely and 63-year-old Helen Thornton, both of whom were denied social security survivors benefits after their partners passed away. The social security administration (SSA) claimed that the defendants were not able to prove that they were married to their partners and spouses for at least nine months prior to their deaths. Ely, a 65-year-old gay man from Arizona, was denied spousal survivor benefits because he and his husband had only been legally married for six months at the time of his husband’s death in 2015. Same-sex marriage had just been legalized in Arizona when they decided to marry, making it impossible for Ely to fulfill the nine-month requirement. Additionally, the decision didn’t take into account that he and his spouse had been in a relationship for 43-years prior to their union.
Similarly, Thornton, a 63-year-old lesbian from Washington State, was deemed ineligible for spousal survivor benefits when her partner died of cancer in 2006. Thornton and her partner were never legally married at the time of the incident despite them having been in a 27-year-relationship. According to the Civil Bar Justice Center, “Thornton requested that the SSA reconsider her application and provided evidence to demonstrate they had been in a committed relationship. The SSA categorically denied her application again because, at the time of [her partner’s] death in 2006, the State of Washington did not recognize same-sex marriages.”
In 2018, Lambda Legal filed suits on behalf of Mr. Ely and Ms. Thornton, arguing that SSA’s nine-month marriage rule was unconstitutional. Thanks to some help from the Biden Administration, the United States Justice Department and SSA recently dropped their appeals on both cases. The SSA will now process benefits for LGBTQ survivors if they can show they were in a committed relationship and would have married if possible. Alternatively, if married, those looking to receive benefits can also show proof that they were married for less than nine months before their spouse died. Additionally, survivors who faced denials under the prior policy, are now eligible for back pay.
A total of 6 million people receive survivor benefits from the SSA each month. Those payments can be crucial for family members with children or retired individuals living on a fixed income.
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