[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 8 (Monday, January 12, 2026)]
[House]
[Pages H634-H637]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
ENDING IMPROPER PAYMENTS TO DECEASED PEOPLE ACT
Mr. SMITH of Missouri. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and
pass the bill (S. 269) to improve
=========================== NOTE ===========================
On January 12, 2026, page H634, in the second column, the
following appeared:and pass the bill (H.R. 269) to improve
The online version has been corrected to read:and pass the bill
(S. 269) to improve
========================= END NOTE =========================
coordination between Federal and State agencies and the Do Not Pay
working system.The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The text of the bill is as follows:
S. 269
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 ``Ending Improper Payments to
Deceased People Act''.
SEC. 2. IMPROVING COORDINATION BETWEEN FEDERAL AND STATE
AGENCIES AND THE DO NOT PAY WORKING SYSTEM.
(a) In General.--Section 205(r) of the Social Security Act
(42 U.S.C. 405(r)), as amended by section 801(a)(7) of title
VIII of division FF of the Consolidated Appropriations Act,
2021 (Public Law 116-260), is amended by striking paragraph
(11) and inserting the following:
``(11) The Commissioner of Social Security shall, to the
extent feasible, provide information furnished to the
Commissioner under paragraph (1) to the agency operating the
Do Not Pay working system described in section 3354(c) of
title 31, United States Code, for the authorized uses of the
Do Not Pay working system to help prevent improper payments
of, and support the recovery of improperly paid, benefits or
other payments through a cooperative arrangement with such
agency, provided that the requirements of subparagraphs (A)
and (B) of paragraph (3) are met with respect to such
arrangement with such agency. The Commissioner of Social
Security and the agency operating the Do Not Pay working
system shall, while the data described in the preceding
sentence is being provided to the agency operating the Do Not
Pay working system, enter into an agreement based upon an
agreed upon methodology, which covers the proportional share
of State death data costs, which the Commissioner of Social
Security and the agency operating the Do Not Pay working
system may periodically review.
``(12) The Commissioner of Social Security may not record a
death to a record that may be provided under this section for
any individual unless the Commissioner of Social Security has
found it has clear and convincing evidence to support that
the individual should be presumed to be deceased.''.
(b) Improving Coordination Regarding Individuals
Incorrectly Identified as Deceased.--Section 205(r)(7) of the
Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 405(r)(7)), as added by
section 801(a)(4) of title VIII of division FF of the
Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (Public Law 116-260),
is amended by striking ``and'' at the end of subparagraph
(A), by striking the period at the end of subparagraph (B)
and inserting ``; and'', and by adding at the end the
following new subparagraph:
``(C) notify any agency that has a cooperative arrangement
with the Commissioner of Social Security under paragraph (3)
or (11) of the error.''.
(c) Effective Date.--The amendments made by this section
shall take effect on December 27, 2026.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
Missouri (Mr. Smith) and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett) each
will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Missouri.
General Leave
Mr. SMITH of Missouri. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that
all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks
and submit extraneous material on the bill under consideration.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Missouri?
There was no objection.
Mr. SMITH of Missouri. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I
may consume.
Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the Ending Improper Payments to
Deceased People Act.
This bipartisan bill continues a bipartisan policy that has already
enabled the Federal Government to identify, prevent, and recover
hundreds of millions of dollars of improper payments made to dead
people.
Currently, the Social Security Administration has temporary authority
to share its death data with the Treasury Department's Do Not Pay
Portal to identify, prevent, and recover improper payments. In its
first year alone, Treasury reported this data exchange saved American
taxpayers over $108 million.
Unfortunately, Social Security's authority to share its data with
Treasury is temporary and lapses at the end of this year if Congress
doesn't pass this bill. That would only increase the likelihood that
more taxpayer money is erroneously sent to dead people. In 2023 alone,
before this policy was implemented, the Office of Management and Budget
found the Federal Government sent $1.3 billion to dead people. That is
unacceptable. The American people expect Congress to safeguard their
hard-earned tax money from waste, fraud, and abuse.
I thank Representative Higgins for his leadership on this issue as
well as
[[Page H635]]
Senator Kennedy. As a former law enforcement officer, Clay Higgins has
worked to protect Americans from criminals, and now he is translating
that commitment into finding ways that we can protect taxpayer dollars
as well.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes.
Madam Speaker, information on the deceased is already shared among
Federal agencies under existing law. This is really a trivial bill that
is designed only to make it appear that Republicans are doing something
about supposed fraud. An independent investigation found that the
Social Security Administration has an incredible success rate with less
than 1 percent of payments found to be improper, some of those being
overpayments and some of those being underpayments.
Today, of course, is not the first time we have heard these claims
about fraudulent Social Security payments to the dead. Indeed, from
that very podium, Madam Speaker, we heard President Trump last March
come to give a lengthy address to a joint session of this Congress. In
his remarks that combined misinformation, outright lies, and a good
many platitudes, the President devoted special attention to Social
Security, ridiculing it with outlandish tales. He spoke of ``3.9
million people from ages 130 to 139, 3.5 million people from ages 140
to 149. And money is being paid to many of them.''
What nonsense. Thanks to the anti-fraud guardrails that are already
available, that has not happened, and the President's representation
was absolutely wrong.
While today's bill essentially duplicates existing efforts to prevent
erroneous payments, the focus on improper payments to deceased people
is just another part of the Republican plan to undermine public
confidence in Social Security, a social insurance program that has been
one of the most valuable initiatives ever approved in this Congress.
Yet Trump appointed Elon Musk, who proclaimed that Social Security is
``a Ponzi scheme.'' He gave him the authority to take a hatchet to the
Social Security Administration. For months, DOGE, the department of
government evisceration, promoted related lies.
Undermining the delivery of checks and quality service, the Trump
regime, through DOGE, abruptly fired thousands of Social Security
workers, and it continues to enact erratic policy changes. This comes
on top of years of Republican opposition to adequately staffing the
Social Security Administration.
Social Security has less staff today than it did a decade ago,
despite the fact that it now serves many, many more Americans. As a
result, at Social Security, under the Trump regime, there is a backlog
of 6 million cases, public inquiries, along with an agency that is
riddled with errors and delays from the shortage of adequate staffing.
Now, the plan from the Trump regime on Social Security is to cut in-
person visits at offices around the country, which is just another
effort to obstruct Americans from getting straight answers, not from a
machine but from a person, concerning their hard-earned benefits. These
are just more ways to cause Americans to question this vital Federal
program so that nobody is surprised if, one day, the payments are late
or the trust fund is insufficient.
We have had one current Member of the United States Senate, a
Republican, who has declared that what we need to do, he insists, is to
``pull it up by the roots and get rid of it'' with reference to Social
Security.
Providing modest retirement, disability, and retirement benefits to
69 million Americans, Social Security is what puts food in the fridge
and keeps the lights on week after week.
For 22 million Americans, Social Security is the difference between
living in poverty, and for 40 percent, it is more than one-half of
their income.
It is a lifesaving, irreplaceable, social contract. As stewards of
this hard-earned benefit, we must protect taxpayers' dollars, but empty
promises to address supposed fraud are not the answer.
Americans deserve a restored watchdog and efficient program at Social
Security that ensures swift and easy access to their payments.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
{time} 1650
Mr. SMITH of Missouri. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the
gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Estes).
Mr. ESTES. Madam Speaker, I thank Chairman Smith for yielding time to
me on this important topic.
It is important to be here today to express my support for S. 269,
the Ending Improper Payments to Deceased People Act. It is commonsense
legislation that taxpayers should not be footing the bill for people
who are deceased.
The purpose of this legislation is to permanently authorize the
Social Security Administration to share its full Death Master File with
the Treasury's Do Not Pay service. The Death Master File that is
generated by Social Security is the best, if not the only national file
that identifies the death of individuals throughout the country. This
access will allow Federal agencies to have the updated, complete death
data necessary to verify benefit eligibility and prevent erroneous
overpayments.
We are well aware that the Federal Government has a major spending
problem, and we face a massive problem continuing to pay people for all
sorts of Federal programs, including Social Security, who have passed
away. In FY 2024 alone, Federal agencies reported over $162 billion in
improper payments. By making this data exchange permanent, the Bureau
of Fiscal Service projects that we will save $330 million across the
Federal Government by December of 2026.
As the chairman of the Social Security Subcommittee, I am committed
to enforcing this legislation and protecting the integrity of our
programs for the American taxpayer.
Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself another 5 minutes.
This bill is really another missed opportunity. The protections that
are most urgently needed are not these new guardrails, but guardrails
to protect our inalienable right to privacy.
Through the Privacy Act and other means, this Congress has long set
limits on what the government can and cannot do with intimate details
that it collects about each American. Government officials are not free
to use our sensitive personal data however they wish, but that may
actually be happening under the Trump regime.
When this legislation was before the Ways and Means Committee, I
offered an amendment to address a serious and looming threat to our
privacy. The Trump administration is pursuing an unprecedented effort
to consolidate Federal data on virtually every American into a single,
centralized master file, a de facto digital ID on every American.
This would be a digital record containing most anything that any part
of the government knows about you, tracking where you live, where you
work, your earnings, your bank account, your health insurance, your
child support agreements, and more.
To understand the scope of this extraordinary project, my amendment
required the administration to produce materials related to the Social
Security Administration's role in data aggregation and its chosen
contractor, Palantir, a company that one Silicon Valley executive once
described as ``building the infrastructure of the police state.'' This
project would further empower a President whose priorities include
revenge, personal enrichment, and self-glorification to misuse this
data.
Beyond the obvious danger of empowering a surveillance state or
enabling the targeting of political opponents, the other danger
associated with this mass centralization is that this sensitive
information held by the Federal Government in one place could be
exposed to hacking. One vulnerability, one malicious actor, one insider
threat, and millions of Americans could be exposed.
A whistleblower has already revealed that the Social Security records
of roughly 300 million Americans were uploaded into an unsecured cloud
environment without adequate safeguards. Internal Federal reviews have
identified serious weaknesses in Palantir's systems.
One internal U.S. Army memorandum described Palantir's platform
[[Page H636]]
as ``very high risk,'' warning that any unauthorized user, regardless
of clearance, could access all the applications and datasets, the very
kind of thing that would interfere with our privacy from private
entities.
Palantir, of course, disputes these findings, but the concerns are
real, and the consequences of getting it wrong would be enormous. My
approach would not have stopped this project. It would not have
dismantled anything. It simply would have required transparency, basic
disclosure of how Social Security data has been used or misused by the
Trump regime in the creation of this centralized database.
Yet, despite the gravity of these concerns, Republicans voted to
block this reasonable inquiry from a regime that seems to thrive on
secrecy.
This vote follows a troubling pattern that occurred right here in the
House when rules were adopted to block a resolution of inquiry that I
and other Members had to ask for this data from the administration.
Twice now, Republicans have adopted special rules, extraordinary
measures that are designed to prevent the House from ever considering
this question. Twice they have used the process to hide from the
American people what is happening and to protect their Members from
having to take a vote about this sweeping intrusion into our privacy.
Remarkably, Palantir has even said they are willing to support the
resolution. That hasn't been enough for our Republican colleagues. This
is the time for sunlight instead of fear of sunlight. It is unfortunate
that this transparency, which should not be controversial, is not
included in this bill.
I will be voting for this bill, as we did in committee, but it is
relatively meaningless, and the big issues of the day are not being
addressed in this legislation.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SMITH of Missouri. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bean).
Mr. BEAN of Florida. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman for the
time.
Madam Speaker, if there is one group of Americans who definitely
shouldn't be receiving Federal payments, it is the dearly departed.
There is a famous line in the movie ``The Sixth Sense'' where the star
says: ``I see dead people.'' Our Treasury Department doesn't see dead
people. They just write them checks.
Year after year, gaps in our data system allow improper payments to
flow to individuals who are no longer living. It is wasteful,
avoidable, and undermines trust in government-run programs.
As founder and co-chair of the DOGE Caucus, I am proud to support the
Ending Improper Payments to Deceased People Act. It is a commonsense,
bipartisan effort to strengthen the accuracy of the Death Master File,
improve data sharing across Federal agencies, and ensure that benefits
programs have the timely, reliable information they need to verify
eligibility, and a pulse, before payments go out the door.
The results, Madam Speaker, speak for themselves. The Treasury
Department recently announced it recovered $31 million in fraud and
improper payments in just the first 5 months of test driving and
implementing these reforms. The legislation makes these temporary
provisions permanent and stops payments to deceased individuals moving
forward.
Madam Speaker, this bill is a big step toward accountability, and I
urge my colleagues on all sides of the aisle to join me in supporting
this vital antifraud, antiwaste, antiabuse legislation.
As the saying goes: You can't take it with you, so let's stop writing
checks to dead people.
Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.
Madam Speaker, I think it would be more accurate to say this bill is
a tiny step, it is a trivial step, and it is curious how narrow the
interest of our Republican colleagues are with regard to fraud.
Trump has been busy pardoning one fraudster after another. We haven't
heard a peep from our Republican colleagues about that nor about his
wrongful action within days of his inauguration of abruptly and
unjustifiably firing the chief inspector general of the Social Security
Administration. That is the public watchdog who is there to ensure that
no fraud--dead, living, or otherwise--occurs. In only a single year,
that inspector general had saved Social Security about $12.4 billion
through audits and investigations.
House Republicans have similarly remained totally mute about the fact
that as of today, almost a year later, Trump has continued his failure
to nominate a replacement inspector general. They are apparently not
too eager about addressing fraud to have a real watchdog there.
Just as they yell ``fraud'' as an excuse to replace ObamaCare with
Republican nothing care, while Trump reinstates the suspended insurance
brokers that were causing the fraud, the Trump regime and its
congressional enablers are really just yelling ``fraud'' as a cover for
the real agenda, which is to privatize Social Security.
Trump's Treasury Secretary, Mr. Bessent, recently blew their cover by
indicating that the big, ugly bill about which Republicans have been so
gleeful is really a ``back door'' to privatize Social Security, a step
that will undermine the program that so many Americans are counting on.
This bill offers no additional protection to them or to the taxpayer.
What it does do is continue the myth that Social Security is
fraudulent, that it is not delivering the benefits that Americans have
been able to rely on for generations, and with appropriate action will
be able to rely upon for generations to come.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
{time} 1700
Mr. SMITH of Missouri. Madam Speaker, I am prepared to close, and I
reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
As stewards of Americans' hard-earned tax dollars, we have a
responsibility to ensure efficient and appropriate government spending.
The dollars that have been spent on Social Security have been spent
well and effectively to benefit millions.
For years, I have sought action on several fraud prevention measures,
efforts that have been repeatedly rejected, not even heard by the
Republican majority.
Ignoring my legislation and other proposals that have been offered
from the Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General, another
inspector general that was fired by President Trump, Republicans
instead offer this minor bill that does little to address fraud, that
raises a myth concerning payments to the deceased, and perpetuates that
myth that Social Security should be, in the words of one Republican
Senator: pulled up by its roots and gotten rid of.
It is all fear-mongering from some of the same people who recently
enacted a truly horrifying scheme with the largest cuts to healthcare
and SNAP food assistance in the history of this country, all in order
to further enrich some billionaire donors. These cuts leave millions of
children, people with disabilities, and seniors without access to a
doctor, struggling to afford their medications, and unable to receive
in-home support.
The billionaire class was so greedy that even $1 trillion in cuts to
healthcare wasn't enough to pay for everything that they demanded. The
total receipt from Republicans' legislation means that trillions of
dollars are being added to our national debt, even after these
draconian cuts to healthcare. Those additions to the national debt will
endanger the long-term promise of Social Security and Medicare.
This legislation does nothing to address Social Security's guarantee
to American workers. If this Congress fails to act, the Federal
Government will default in 2032, and people would see their Social
Security payments cut.
Meanwhile, this bill also ignores the Trump regime's effort, which I
discussed, about the development of a digital file on every American
and the invasion of our privacy. It is good that this legislation
requires the Treasury Department's Do Not Pay system to reimburse
Social Security and State agencies for its use of death records that
the States collect and provide to Social Security.
[[Page H637]]
Social Security should not bear the price for that Do Not Pay
system's use of the data. I certainly support that provision, but every
American will bear the cost of Republicans' failure to protect their
hard-earned benefits and private information from Trump's hatchet job
on the Social Security Administration.
While I don't oppose the bill, I do oppose the misrepresentations
that are made about it.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. SMITH of Missouri. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I
may consume.
Madam Speaker, this bill is another piece of the puzzle in the fight
against waste, fraud, and abuse. Before the Social Security
Administration began sharing its complete death records with the
Treasury Department, the Federal Government paid $1.3 billion to the
dead in just a single year.
Congress authorized the Treasury to access Social Security's death
data for 3 years ending in 2026. In the first year alone, Treasury
reported that it helped the Federal Government identify, prevent, or
recover $108 million in improper payments, with another $200 million
expected by the end of this year. It is only common sense to make this
fraud prevention measure permanent.
This policy has already passed both the Senate and the Ways and Means
Committee with broad, bipartisan support. I hope the House does the
same and sends this to President Trump's desk as soon as possible.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the
gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Smith) that the House suspend the rules
and pass the bill, S. 269.
The question was taken; and (two-thirds being in the affirmative) the
rules were suspended and the bill was passed.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
____________________