382
Opinion of the Court
II
A
Section 407(a) protects SSI and OASDI benefits from "execution, levy, attachment, garnishment, or other legal process." The Supreme Court of Washington approached respondents' claim by generalizing from this text and concluding that § 407(a) prohibits "creditor-type acts," on which reading it held that the department's reimbursement scheme was prohibited. The analysis was flawed.
First, neither § 407(a) nor the Commissioner's regulations interpreting that provision say anything about "creditors." Cf. Philpott, supra, at 417 ("[Section] 407 does not refer to any 'claim of creditors'; it imposes a broad bar against the use of any legal process to reach all social security benefits"). In fact, the Act and regulations to which we owe deference, see Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837, 842-843 (1984), not only permit certain creditors to serve as representative payees, 42 U. S. C. §§ 405( j)(2)(C)(iii), 1383(a)(2)(B)(v), but allow a representative payee to satisfy even old debts of a beneficiary so long as current and reasonably foreseeable needs will be met and reimbursement is in the beneficiary's interest, 20 CFR §§ 404.2040(d), 416.640(d). Finally, as the Supreme Court of Washington apparently recognized (in qualifying its characterization of "creditor relationship" by referring to the department's acts as merely "creditor-type"), the department is simply not a creditor of the foster care children for whom it serves as representative payee. No law provides that they are liable to repay the department for the costs of their care, and the State of Washington makes no such claim.
The questions to be answered in resolving this case, then, do not go to the State's character as a creditor. The questions, instead, are whether the department's effort to become a representative payee, or its use of respondents' Social Security benefits when it acts in that capacity, amounts to em-
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