Ending Improper Payments to Deceased People Act

Floor Speech

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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.

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