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BOARDMAN -- U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown is again seeking to get his Social Security Fairness Act approved to end restrictions on public employees who pay into the federal Social Security program to get those benefits.
Brown, D-Cleveland, discussed his proposal with police and firefighters Tuesday at a Boardman fire station on Market Street.
This is the fifth time Brown has introduced the bill.
"I don't get discouraged if it takes a long time," he said. "I keep trying."
Brown said he worked for years to get the pensions of thousands of Teamsters restored and succeeded last year with the inclusion of his Butch Lewis Act included last year in the American Rescue Plan. He also said he fought for years to get a child tax credit, but that was only in effect for one year and that fight continues.
"I never say to the people that deserve these pensions to be patient," Brown said. "But I do say I'm going to keep working until we fix it."
Brown's Social Security Pension Act would repeal two bills that are decades old -- the Windfall Elimination Provision, enacted in 1983, and the Government Pension Offset, enacted in 1977 -- from the Social Security Act.
Those bills do not permit public employees -- including teachers, police officers, firefighters and other government workers as well as their surviving spouses -- from collecting Social Security benefits that they pay into from private-sector jobs.
"If you pay into it, you should be eligible for the full benefits you pay for," Brown said. "It's up to Congress to figure out how that happens."
About 3 million people nationwide, including 241,755 Ohioans, are impacted by the current laws, according to Brown's office.
Brown's bill has 38 Democratic and seven Republican co-sponsors in the Senate and about 290 co-sponsors in the House, most of them being Democrats.
It's the largest number of co-sponsors since the bill was first introduced in 2015, Brown said.
Brown acknowledged it will be even more challenging to get the bill passed in the Republican-controlled House because Speaker Kevin McCarthy is "not interested" in it.
"We're going to keep pushing," Brown said.
Joe Iberis, a Mahoning County deputy sheriff and president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 141, said: "This bill is a long time coming" and "it's a very important thing we pass."
Boardman police Lt. John Allsopp added: "We urge Congress to act on this important bill to relieve the financial strain being placed on our nation's public safety retirees including both retired police officers and firefighters."