S. 4952
Protecting American Taxpayers Act
Sponsor: Joni Ernst
29 cosponsors
- Ashley Moody
- Bernie Moreno
- Chuck Grassley
- Cynthia M. Lummis
- David McCormick
- Eric Schmitt
- James C. Justice
- James Lankford
- Jim Banks
- John Barrasso
- John Cornyn
- John Kennedy
- Jon Husted
- Katie Boyd Britt
- Kevin Cramer
- Pete Ricketts
- Roger Marshall
- Steve Daines
- Ted Budd
- Tim Sheehy
- Todd Young
- Bill Hagerty
- Marsha Blackburn
- Roger F. Wicker
- Mike Crapo
- Darline Graham
- James E. Risch
- Alan Armstrong
- Mike Lee
Official summary
No official summary yet.
Text of the bill
A Recovering stolen funds
I Improper Payments
II Assisting Small Businesses Not Fraudsters
III Welfare Abuse and Laundering Zillions
IV Returning Unspent COVID Funds
V Bonuses for cost-cutters
VI Improper payments transparency
B Protecting taxpayers
I Strengthening TANF Program Integrity
II Restriction on United States assistance for foreign agents
III Opposing international support for the Taliban
C Catching fraudsters
I Preventing deep fake scams
II SBA Fraud Enforcement Extension Act
III Recover Fraudulent COVID Funds
IV Fraud Alert Systems
(a) Access to the National Directory of New Hires. Section 453(j) of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 653(j)) is amended by adding at the end the following:
(12) Information to assist in the prevention of improper payments
(A) In general. The Secretary of the Treasury shall have access to the information in the National Directory of New Hires for the purpose of identifying, preventing, and recovering improper payments.
(B) Redisclosure. For the purpose of identifying, preventing, and recovering improper payments, the Secretary of the Treasury may redisclose information in the National Directory of New Hires to—
(i) agents and contractors of the Secretary of the Treasury;
(ii) Federal and non-Federal agencies authorized to receive information in the National Directory of New Hires directly from the Secretary; and
(iii) such additional persons and entities as agreed to by the Secretary and the Secretary of the Treasury.
(b) Access to information covered by FCRA
(1) Definitions. Section 603(k)(1) of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 1681a(k)(1)) is amended—
(A) in subparagraph (A), by striking and at the end;
(B) in subparagraph (B), by striking the period at the end and inserting ; and; and
(C) by adding at the end the following:
(C) does not include—
(i) any change to a Federal disbursement, including the pre-certification termination of such disbursement, that is—
(I) based on a consumer report; and
(II) made to improve the accuracy of the disbursement; or
(ii) any action taken by an authorized user of the Working System of the Do Not Pay Initiative authorized by section 3354 of title 31, United States Code, in connection with the disbursement of a payment, as defined in section 3351 of that title, that is based on a consumer report.
(2) Permissible uses of consumer reports. Section 604(a) of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 1681b(a)) is amended by adding at the end the following:
(7) To the Secretary of the Treasury for purposes of assisting Federal and non-Federal entities identify, prevent, and recover improper payments, including redisclosing information in a consumer report to—
(A) agents and contractors of the Department of the Treasury; and
(B) Federal and non-Federal entities authorized to receive such information directly from the Secretary.
(c) Privacy-Preserving validation of select tax information
(1) In general. Section 6103(i) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 is amended by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
(9) Do not pay working system
(A) In general. In response to an inquiry by the Secretary with respect to a specific individual, the Commissioner shall provide the Secretary with any return information described in subparagraph (B) with respect to such individual for the applicable period, in a manner which preserves the confidentiality of such information, for the purposes of enhancing the Do Not Pay working system described in section 3354(c) of title 31, United States Code, which may include disclosing such information— for purposes of using the Do Not Pay working system to identify, prevent, and recover improper payments.
(i) to agents and contractors of the Department of Treasury who are authorized to access the Do Not Pay working system, and
(ii) other Federal agencies and State agencies that manage Federally-funded State-administered programs (including agents and contractors of such agencies) who are authorized to access the Do Not Pay working system,
(B) Return information. The return information described in this subparagraph is the following:
(i) Taxpayer identification number.
(ii) Filing status.
(iii) Adjusted gross income.
(iv) Income or loss reported on Schedule C of Form 1040 (or successor forms).
(v) Filing year.
(vi) Any reported identity theft related to the taxpayer identification number.
(vii) Whether a tax return was not filed for any taxable year.
(C) Applicable period. For purposes of this paragraph, the term applicable period means, with respect to any individual, the period—
(i) consisting of the number of taxable years specified by the Secretary in the inquiry made under subparagraph (A) (but not less than 3 taxable years), and
(ii) ending with the most recently completed taxable year for which the information described in such subparagraph is available.
(2) Effective date. The amendment made by this subsection shall apply to disclosures made after the date of enactment of this Act.
(d) Access to Social Security information. Title II of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 401 et seq.) is amended by adding at the end the following new section:
235. Disclosure of information for do not pay system
(a) In general. For the purposes described in subsection (b), the Commissioner of Social Security shall, upon request of the Secretary of the Treasury, enter into an agreement with the Department of the Treasury to regularly provide personally identifiable information held by the Social Security Administration, which shall, with respect to any individual, include, at a minimum, the name, date of birth, and Social Security number of such individual.
(b) Purposes. Information provided under subsection (a) shall be used solely for purposes of enhancing the Do Not Pay working system described in section 3354(c) of title 31, United States Code, with respect to identifying, preventing, and recovering improper payments, including fraudulent payments.
V Stopping Transfers of Public Funds Abroad
VI Veterans Scam and Fraud Evasion Act of 2026
VII Expanding Whistleblower Protections for Contractors Act of 2026
D Severability