Thread by @timkmak

As of the end of May, the IRS has sent out almost 1.1 million COVID relief payments, worth $1.4 billion, to dead Americans.

This is the first we're learning about the extent of this IRS problem.

Here's my story about how the IRS ended up sending $1.4 billion in checks to the deceased

npr.org/2020/05/06/851…

We found that people who had died as long ago as Jan 2018 received payments.

https://twitter.com/Hillbilly_Matt/status/1276165620028059649

Meanwhile other Americans who are eligible for the Coronavirus relief payments continue to struggle to get their checks:

https://twitter.com/MackTenn74/status/1276168191337734144

The IRS did not use available death records maintained by the Social Security Administration for its first three batches of payments, which accounted for 72 percent of Coronavirus relief payments.

This, the GAO finds, is why 1.1 million payments went out to the deceased.

The IRS had already implemented -- in 2013! -- a process to use death records to prevent improper payments. The IRS actively bypassed this control for Coronavirus relief payments, which led to the $1.4 billion problem we see now.

Treasury Department at first had no idea that IRS created a process that allowed the deceased to receive Coronavirus relief $$.

When they found out, they conferred with lawyers and decided, that no -- dead Americans are not eligible.

$1.4bil went out the door in the interim.