To prohibit the implementation of discriminatory precertification requirements for the earned income tax credit.

        [Congressional Bills 108th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1894 Introduced in House (IH)]

108th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 1894

To prohibit the implementation of discriminatory precertification
requirements for the earned income tax credit.

_______________________________________________________________________

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

April 30, 2003

Mr. Rangel (for himself, Mr. Stark, Mr. Matsui, Mr. Levin, Mr. Cardin,
Mr. McDermott, Mr. Kleczka, Mr. Lewis of Georgia, Mr. Neal of
Massachusetts, Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Becerra, Mr. Pomeroy, Mr. Sandlin,
Mrs. Jones of Ohio, and Ms. DeLauro) introduced the following bill;
which was referred to the Committee on Ways and Means

_______________________________________________________________________

A BILL

To prohibit the implementation of discriminatory precertification
requirements for the earned income tax credit.

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

SECTION 1. FINDINGS.

The Congress hereby finds that:
(1) Current law authorizes the Internal Revenue Service to
impose additional earned income tax credit eligibility
requirements, such as the current recertification program, only
in cases in which a taxpayer has made prior improper claims of
the earned income tax credit.
(2) The Internal Revenue Service is planning to implement
an earned income tax credit precertification program that
differs from what is authorized under current law in that it
would apply to taxpayers who fall within broad categories even
though they made no prior improper claims for the credit.
(3) There is no precedent in the Internal Revenue Code of
1986 for denying or delaying a tax refund that is apparently
properly claimed on a tax return merely because the taxpayer
meets a certain profile.
(4) The proposed earned income tax credit precertification
program is an affront to our sense of fairness because
compliant taxpayers are treated differently solely by reason of
differing family structures or relationships and solely by
reason of the fact that they are claiming a tax benefit
designed to assist the working poor.
(5) No other family-related tax benefit, such as the
dependency exemption or child tax credit, is subject to such a
precertification requirement; and there is no such
precertification requirement for abusive tax shelters purchased
by corporations or for tax benefits claimed by higher income
individuals.

SEC. 2. PROPOSED EARNED INCOME TAX CREDIT PROFILING NOT PERMITTED.

The Internal Revenue Service shall not implement any system of
precertification for the earned income tax credit that applies to
taxpayers who have not made prior improper claims unless such a system
is hereafter specifically authorized by law.
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