Republican U.S. Senator John Kennedy has joined Democratic Senator Tom Carper of Delaware in introducing the Stopping Improper Payments to Deceased People Act.

Kennedy says in 2015, the Social Security Administration made nearly ten-billion-dollars in improper payments.
“The social security administration, which keeps a list of all the dead people in America, won't give its list to the Department of the Treasury. So, the federal government has been paying dead people.”
After contacting the Social Security Administration as to why they couldn’t share their dead person’s database with the Treasury Department, Kennedy was told they didn’t have the legal authority to do so.  Kennedy says this bill will allow them to trade that information, stopping the waste of billions of dollars.
“The federal bureaucracy borrows one point four billion dollars a day and this is a perfect example of why.”
Kennedy says he and his colleagues are very confident this bill will pass.  After it becomes law, he says he will lead the effort in making those who work in the Social Security Administration and the Treasury Department are held accountable.
“I will check with them every week if I have to... every month.  I'll call them every day.  I'll call them every night until they start doing their job.”

 

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