House Oversight panel backs anti-fraud bill to expand U.S. Treasury payment checks

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House backs anti-fraud payments bill

Highlights

House Committee on Oversight and Accountability backs the bipartisan Pre-Payment Fraud Prevention and Treasury Data Access Act to curb federal payment fraud before disbursements.
Since 2003, over $2.8 trillion in fraudulent and improper payments reported, with $236 billion in such payments estimated for fiscal year 2023 alone.
The bill aims to expand Treasury’s Do Not Pay system usage—currently only 4% of eligible programs—and add more non-sensitive datasets to enhance fraud detection.

Treasury screening plan and bill details

As reported by the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Comer urges House lawmakers to support the Pre-Payment Fraud Prevention and Treasury Data Access Act, a bipartisan measure aimed at preventing fraudulent and improper payments before they are issued by the U.S. Treasury.

In floor remarks prepared for delivery, Comer says the federal government has lost more than $2.8 trillion in fraudulent and improper payments since 2003, citing Government Accountability Office estimates. He says annual improper payments reach nearly $236 billion in fiscal year 2023, while broader fraud across federal programs costs between $233 billion and $521 billion a year.

The legislation requires anti-fraud risk evaluations to identify suspicious payments before agencies request disbursements from Treasury. Comer says the bill also seeks to expand the effectiveness of Treasury's Do Not Pay system, which he says is currently used by only 4 percent of eligible government programs, and to lower barriers to adding more non-sensitive datasets to that system.

Budget pressure and oversight implications

Comer frames the proposal as a financial integrity measure for the U.S. government, arguing that taxpayers bear the cost when fraudulent payments go out and cannot be recovered. He says the scale of losses means each tax filer effectively pays between $1,000 and $3,000 a year for fraud-related costs.

He also says the bill is drafted with privacy stakeholders to preserve safeguards for personal and sensitive information as agencies gain broader access to anti-fraud checks. Comer thanks Ranking Member Robert Garcia and his staff for bipartisan work on the measure, presenting the legislation as a long-delayed reform intended to tighten controls across federal benefit and payment programs.

In our earlier article on the IRS Security Summit overhaul, we outlined how the IRS and its public-private partners are restructuring their anti-fraud collaboration to counter identity theft and fraudulent tax returns. The updated framework expands information sharing across the tax system, adds real-time fraud detection, and brings payroll-industry stakeholders into five work groups designed to spot and stop suspicious activity earlier.

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