Reagan willingness to Cut Benefits Hike Told : Would Consider Eliminating Cost--of--Living Rise Planned in ’86 if Democrats Propose It, Aide Says

President Reagan would consider eliminating the Social Security cost-of-living increase scheduled for January, 1986, if the Democratic congressional leadership proposed such a step and worked for it, a senior Administration official said Monday.

Although there appears to be little prospect that Democratic leaders will follow that course, the official’s comments represented the first hint that Reagan would consider backing down on his campaign promise not to tamper with Social Security benefits. Publicly, Reagan has continued to insist that he considers Social Security benefits untouchable.

In fact, about the time the official was interviewed at a not-for-attribution lunch with reporters, White House spokesman Larry Speakes told a press briefing that Reagan still strongly opposes tampering with Social Security benefits.

Dole Favors Move

So far, most of the impetus for limiting the cost-of-living raise for Social Security recipients as part of a deficit reduction plan has come from Senate Republicans headed by new Majority Leader Robert J. Dole (R-Kan.). In a recent interview, Dole predicted that Congress will pass a deficit reduction package trimming not only Social Security benefits but also defense spending, another item Reagan has ruled untouchable.

Senate Budget Committee Chairman Pete V. Domenici (R-N.M.) and Sen. Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.), the newly elected majority whip, also have supported limiting the cost-of-living increase.

Rep. James R. Jones (D-Okla.), one of the few Democrats to publicly endorse the idea, said he believes the public, including Social Security recipients, would accept a limit “if it is perceived as fair-share sacrifice” aimed at reducing the deficit. Jones, House Budget Committee chairman during Reagan’s first term, had earlier proposed limiting the cost-of-living raise.

Jones’ successor as Budget Committee chairman, Rep. William H. Gray III (D-Pa.), said he believes the House should seek to put together a budget-reduction package without cutting Social Security benefits but added: “We may not be able to do that.”

The senior Administration official who talked with reporters insisted that although Reagan would consider a Democratic proposal to freeze Social Security benefits in 1986, the President still believes strongly in his campaign pledge not to tamper with benefits. He added that Reagan will actively oppose any freeze proposal without “an overwhelming consensus for it in both parties.”

In the campaign, Democratic nominee Walter F. Mondale accused Reagan of having a “secret plan” to cut benefits. Reagan declared during his first debate with Mondale: “A President should never say ‘never,’ but I am going to violate the rule and say ‘never.’ I will never reduce Social Security benefits to people that are now getting them.”

When Mondale retorted after the debate that Reagan did not rule out cuts for persons not yet on the Social Security rolls, Speakes said Reagan “will never stand for a reduction of Social Security benefits for anybody--those now getting them or future recipients, period.”

Beyond Social Security, the Administration official said Reagan remains adamantly opposed to any further reductions in defense spending and tax increases to reduce the deficit.

The Administration has “a realistic chance” of getting a tax simplification measure through Congress, he said, but not if the proposal raises revenue as part of the deficit-reduction process.

On another subject, the official confirmed that yet another conservative ideologue--Faith Ryan Whittlesey, Reagan’s assistant for public liaison--plans to leave the White House. She is expected to be nominated to serve as ambassador to Switzerland, a post she held from 1981 to 1983.

Whittlesey’s departure probably will intensify the pressure on Reagan from conservative Republican activists to appoint another conservative ideologue to a high White House post. They have already been campaigning for such an appointment because of the impending departure of White House counselor Edwin Meese III, who is expected to win early Senate confirmation as attorney general.

A Slot for Kirkpatrick

Although they have urged that Reagan find a top Administration position for Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, who has announced her resignation as ambassador to the United Nations effective March 1, White House Chief of Staff James A. Baker III indicated the President has not yet found a place for her.

“The President wants to keep her,” Baker said, “and hopefully he can find a slot for her.”

She is unlikely to wind up at the White House, however. Reagan, in an interview with the Washington Times, said he has no position worthy of her in the White House. Moreover, Baker and other top officials are known to strongly oppose putting her there.

One senior White House official, declaring that foreign policy operations under Secretary of State George P. Shultz and National Security Adviser Robert C. McFarlane are “running smoothly,” said Kirkpatrick would be “a disaster” as an additional foreign policy adviser.