Senator’s resolution designates March 5th as “National Slam the Scam Day”
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Senate approved Arizona senior senator Kyrsten Sinema’s bipartisan resolution with Republican Senator Susan Collins (Maine) designating March 5th as “National Slam the Scam Day.”
“Raising awareness of predatory scams will help protect Arizona seniors’ hard earned retirement benefits. I’ll keep working across the aisle to hold criminals accountable and crack down on illegal scams,” said Sinema, a member of the Senate Aging Committee.
Sinema’s bipartisan resolution raises awareness and educates the public on government imposter telephone scams in which criminals pretend to be government employees to mislead victims into providing personal information or money. In 2018, the Arizona Attorney General noted an uptick in government imposter scams and the Federal Trade Commission recently reported that victims lost nearly $153 million to government imposter scams in 2019. Social Security-related scams in particular have skyrocketed over the past year to become the #1 type of consumer fraud reported.
While Sinema was in the U.S. House, she worked with the Chairman of the Senate Aging Committee, Republican Senator Susan Collins (Maine), to pass the Senior Safe Act into law, empowering financial institutions to report suspected instances of elder financial abuse and fraud. In the U.S. Senate, Sinema and Senator Collins have continued their work by introducing the Senior Security Act, which would create a task force at the Securities and Exchange Commission to protect seniors from financial crimes, and the Anti-Spoofing Penalties Modernization Act, which would increase penalties for criminals who use robocalls to harass seniors and veterans.
While serving in the U.S. House, Sinema also partnered with Republican Senator Tim Scott (South Carolina) to pass the Protecting Children from Identity Theft Act, requiring the Social Security Administration to develop a database to facilitate the verification of consumer information upon request by a certified financial institution to especially protect children who are often targeted for identity theft. She also successfully advocated on behalf of Arizona parents and children to cut red tape at SSA, ensuring victims of identity theft can get new Social Security Numbers and the fresh start they deserve.