BOSTON — Congressional Democrats warned Tuesday that rising wait times for assistance at the Social Security Administration and the prospect of delayed checks amount to a “backdoor cut” to benefits.

For weeks, the Trump administration has been implementing a series of significant shifts to the agency that oversees Social Security payments for tens of millions of Americans, arguing that officials need to rein in wasteful payments to recipients who do not qualify.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly said he does not intend to cut benefits, but Democrats contend that the changes he and his deputies have embraced put support further out of reach for many older Americans who for years paid into the system.

“When there is a mistake, and when someone can’t get that mistake corrected and start their Social Security benefits on time, that is a benefits cut,” U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said Tuesday. “When there is a mistake, and fixing that mistake is just too hard to manage because no one answers the phone and the local Social Security office is closed, and the line at the other office is hours long, and someone finally just gives up, that is a benefits cut. When checks get delayed and seniors have to borrow money to pay rent or they have to go without food, that is a benefits cut.”

“Every one of those changes is effectively a back-door cut to the benefits that the law guarantees to every Social Security recipient,” she added. “Trump and [Elon] Musk can’t cut benefits directly, so they think they can get away with indirect cuts, but Democrats are here to fight them every step of the way.”

Warren joined other Senate Democrats to launch a “War Room” Tuesday to oppose potential negative impacts to Social Security. They addressed reporters after the Senate Finance Committee held a hearing about advancing Trump’s nominee to lead the Social Security Administration, business executive Frank Bisignano.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer described Bisignano’s appointment as “hiring an arsonist to run the fire station.”

House Democrats also mounted a response Tuesday, convening a hearing to discuss potential Republican-led changes to Social Security and to solicit testimony warning about dire impacts.

Republicans continue to contend that neither Bisignano nor Trump intends to touch benefit levels.

“No one on our side, including the nominee, has said that they are going to cut Social Security benefits,” Sen. Mike Crapo, a Republican from Idaho, said at the Finance Committee hearing he chaired. “In fact, the president has made it clear he will not support cutting Social Security benefits, and the bottom line is the nominee is not even at the Social Security Administration yet.”

Trump, Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency have moved to implement staffing cuts at the Social Security Administration and to change what services are available over the phone.

At the end of February, the SSA announced it would move to slash about 7,000 employees — roughly 12% of its current staff — “to reduce the size of its bloated workforce and organizational structure, with a significant focus on functions and employees who do not directly provide mission critical services.”

The agency also plans to eliminate the ability for some recipients to verify their identity over the phone, instead requiring them to do so online or in field offices, starting April 14.

Those phone changes were scheduled to begin at the end of March, but officials pushed back the effective date by two weeks.

“A delay is not a reprieve,” U.S. Rep. Richard Neal, a Massachusetts Democrat, said at a House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee hearing Tuesday. “Their plan is to make it hard to access it and then complain that it doesn’t work, and that’s always been part of their strategy.”

Reports in recent weeks have documented multiple website crashes and growing phone line wait times.

In the Bay State, nonprofit social services organization The Arc of Massachusetts alerted members Tuesday that it “learned that there is a new, concerning message appearing on Social Security accounts that are managed by a representative payee (rep payee).”

“We have seen dozens of reports of individuals logging on to the Social Security Administration (SSA) website to the following notification: ‘This beneficiary is currently not receiving payments,’” the organization wrote in a message to its network. “We understand this is an area of incredible concern for individuals and families in our community. As such, we are communicating with our Massachusetts congressional delegation and leadership at The Arc of the United States in order to determine answers as to what is occurring here.”

Martin O’Malley, a former Democratic governor of Maryland who led the Social Security Administration for 11 months under former President Joe Biden, told lawmakers Tuesday that staffing cuts and longer wait times could combine into a “cascading event that will ultimately interrupt the payment of benefits for some time.”

“I truly believe that for the first time in 90 years, those benefits are going to be interrupted for some time,” O’Malley said at the hearing hosted by House Democrats. “It would appear that what they’re trying to do is crater this agency and kneecap its ability to serve the public.”

The all-Democrat House committee invited O’Malley, Social Security recipients, and agency staff to testify about their concerns. Rennie Glasgow, a claims technical expert in the SSA office in Schenectady, New York, told lawmakers he believes the agency is being “deliberately sabotaged.”