[Congressional Bills 106th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 5117 Referred in Senate (RFS)]

  2d Session
                                H. R. 5117


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                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

           September 27 (legislative day, September 22), 2000

     Received; read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 AN ACT


 
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to clarify the allowance of 
the child credit, the deduction for personal exemptions, and the earned 
      income credit for missing children, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Missing Children Tax Fairness Act of 
2000''.

SEC. 2. TREATMENT OF MISSING CHILDREN WITH RESPECT TO CERTAIN TAX 
              BENEFITS.

    (a) In General.--Subsection (c) of section 151 of the Internal 
Revenue Code of 1986 (relating to additional exemption for dependents) 
is amended by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
            ``(6) Treatment of missing children.--
                    ``(A) In general.--Solely for the purposes referred 
                to in subparagraph (B), a child of the taxpayer--
                            ``(i) who is presumed by law enforcement 
                        authorities to have been kidnapped by someone 
                        who is not a member of the family of such child 
                        or the taxpayer, and
                            ``(ii) who was (without regard to this 
                        paragraph) the dependent of the taxpayer for 
                        the taxable year in which the kidnapping 
                        occurred,
                shall be treated as a dependent of the taxpayer for all 
                taxable years ending during the period that the child 
                is kidnapped.
                    ``(B) Purposes.--Subparagraph (A) shall apply 
                solely for purposes of determining--
                            ``(i) the deduction under this section,
                            ``(ii) the credit under section 24 
                        (relating to child tax credit), and
                            ``(iii) whether an individual is a 
                        surviving spouse or a head of a household (such 
                        terms are defined in section 2).
                    ``(C) Comparable treatment for earned income 
                credit.--For purposes of section 32, an individual--
                            ``(i) who is presumed by law enforcement 
                        authorities to have been kidnapped by someone 
                        who is not a member of the family of such 
                        individual or the taxpayer, and
                            ``(ii) who had, for the taxable year in 
                        which the kidnapping occurred, the same 
                        principal place of abode as the taxpayer for 
                        more than one-half of the portion of such year 
                        before the date of the kidnapping,
                shall be treated as meeting the requirement of section 
                32(c)(3)(A)(ii) with respect to a taxpayer for all 
                taxable years ending during the period that the 
                individual is kidnapped.
                    ``(D) Termination of treatment.--Subparagraphs (A) 
                and (C) shall cease to apply as of the first taxable 
                year of the taxpayer beginning after the calendar year 
                in which there is a determination that the child is 
                dead (or, if earlier, in which the child would have 
                attained age 18).''
    (b) Effective Date.--The amendment made by this section shall apply 
to taxable years ending after the date of the enactment of this Act.

            Passed the House of Representatives September 26, 2000.

            Attest:

                                                 JEFF TRANDAHL,

                                                                 Clerk.