My ex wife works for the state of ohio, they have there own retirement plan, with that she can’t claim social security benefits of her own , can she claim social security benefits to n my social security? We were married 18 yrs been divorced 17 yrs

Hi. Your ex-wife could claim divorced spousal or survivor benefits from your account, but it sounds like any benefits she qualifies for would be subject to at least partial withholding due to the Government Pension Offset (GPO) provision (https://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10007.pdf).

To start with, in order to qualify for divorced spousal benefits your ex-wife would need to be unmarried and at least age 62, and you would need to either be at least age 62 or drawing Social Security retirement or disability benefits. Even then, though, if she's receiving a pension from the Ohio state pension plan based on her non-Social Security covered earnings, then Social Security would need to withhold from her divorced spousal or survivor benefits an amount equal to 2/3rds of the amount of her state pension. In that case, your ex-wife would only be able to collect Social Security divorced spousal or survivor benefits if her benefit rate is more than 2/3rds of the gross amount of her state pension.

Best, Jerry