When Advocacy Becomes “Adversarial”: Navigating Retaliation and Judicial Overreach in the Disability Hearing Process (Presented by National Organization of Social Security Claimants’ Representatives)

This panel will examine the growing tension between zealous advocacy and administrative retaliation in the Social Security disability hearing process. Practitioners are increasingly penalized for doing their jobs—objecting to improper consultative examinations and unqualified medical experts, challenging vocational witnesses, engaging in meaningful cross-examination, and insisting on due process for their clients. Judges often label legitimate advocacy as obstruction, impose arbitrary time limits on questioning, and criticize representatives for doing too much rather than too little. The discussion will explore how these dynamics erode fairness, discourage transparency, and create a chilling effect on the very advocacy the system depends on to…