Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act of 2014-Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

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Ms. KLOBUCHAR. I rise today to urge my colleagues to pass the Stopping Tax Offenders and Prosecuting Identity Theft Act of 2013.

Before we have another year--yet another year--of criminals stealing the tax returns of millions of hardworking Americans, we need to pass this bipartisan bill.

Let me tell you from the start this is a bill that I introduced with Senator Sessions of Alabama. This is a bill that made it through the Judiciary Committee 18 to 0. After a number of amendments were considered and rejected, this bill made it through the Judiciary Committee--in which there are many different people of ideological views--18 to 0.

So what is this about? We have a problem in this country, and it is a problem I think people would be very surprised about if they knew how much money it involved. Criminals are increasingly filing false tax returns using stolen identity information in order to claim victims' refunds.

What does this mean? How much money are we talking about?

In 2012 alone, identity thieves filed 1.8 million fraudulent tax returns, almost double the number confirmed in 2011. The numbers in the documents in these cases may be forged, but the dollars behind them are real.

In 2012, there were another 1.1 million fraudulent tax returns that slipped through the cracks, and our U.S. Treasury paid out--are you ready for this--$3.6 billion in fraudulent returns, $3.6 billion at a time when we have a debt. At a time when we are cutting programs and doing everything we can to make the government more accountable, we paid out $3.6 billion in fraudulent returns. That is taxpayers' dollars going down the drain.

But when the criminals file these fake tax returns, it is not only the Treasury that loses out. Everyday people are the real victims, forced to wait months--sometimes even years--before receiving the refunds that are owed to them, and it can take years to fix the problems when you have your identity stolen.

In 2012, Alan Stender, a retired businessman from the 5,000-person town of Circle Pines, MN, was working to file his taxes on time, just as so many Americans did this past month. After completing all the forms and sending in his tax returns, Alan heard from the IRS that there was a major problem. Someone had stolen his identity and used his personal information to fraudulently file his return and steal his tax refund.

Last month, 25 people were arrested in Florida for using thousands of stolen identities to claim $36 million in fraudulent tax refunds. This included the arrest of a middle-school food service worker who stole the identities of more than 400 students. Those victims are just kids. Yet criminals are stealing their identities to get fake tax returns.

Attorney General of the United States of America Eric Holder had his tax ID stolen. Two young adults used his name, date of birth, and Social Security number to file a fraudulent tax return. They got caught and they got prosecuted. But when our own Attorney General of the United States is a victim of tax fraud--people stealing his identity--I think it is time to admit we have a problem. From a retired man in Minnesota, to middle-school students in Florida, to the Attorney General of the United States, it is clear identity theft can happen to anyone.

We also know this crime can victimize our most vulnerable citizens--seniors living on fixed incomes or people with disabilities depending on tax returns to make ends meet. These people cannot financially manage having their tax returns stolen. There is a lot at stake here, and bipartisan action is needed. That is why I put forward this bipartisan piece of legislation along with Republican Senator Jeff Sessions to take on this problem and crack down on the criminals who are committing this crime.

The critical legislation--which, by the way, has a similar version that passed in the House last year--will take important steps to streamline law enforcement resources and strengthen penalties for tax identity theft. The STOP Identity Theft Act will direct the Justice Department to dedicate resources to address tax identity theft. It directs the Department to focus on parts of the country with especially high rates of tax return identity theft and boosts protections for vulnerable citizens such as seniors and veterans. We also urge the Justice Department to cooperate fully and coordinate in investigations with State and local law enforcement agencies.

Identity thieves have become more creative and have expanded from stealing the identities of individuals to stealing that of businesses and organizations. My bill recognizes this change and broadens the definition of tax identity theft to include businesses, nonprofits, and other similar organizations. This is something that came to us from law enforcement. This is a bill that passed through the Judiciary Committee of the Senate--not an easy journey--18 to 0.

Finally, we need to crack down on the criminals committing this crime. The bill would strengthen penalties from tax identity theft by raising the jail sentence. I believe this bill would go a long way in helping law enforcement use their resources to more efficiently and effectively go after these crimes. It is time to pass it through the Senate. As I said, it passed through the House of Representatives.

In recent weeks, we have made significant progress by passing this bill out of, as I said, the Senate Judiciary Committee. I thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle. We had votes on amendments in the Judiciary Committee, which some may hear about soon, that were rejected but were heard out. We had very good discussions and arguments, and I believe that is why I got the support of the people who were putting those amendments forward. Senator Hatch himself said one of those amendments belonged in the Finance Committee. In any case, we came together in the Judiciary Committee, voted for this bill 18 to 0, and it is now time to get it through the Senate.

With an 18-to-0 vote, I should have been able to bring this bill to the full Senate, but I know my colleague from Texas has some concerns, even though he is on the record supporting this bill in committee. The time is now to pass this bipartisan piece of legislation to crack down on identity thieves and protect the hard-earned tax dollars of innocent Americans.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 316, S. 149, the STOP Identity Theft Act, the bill be read a third time and passed, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate.

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Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, the bill I put out on the floor is a bipartisan bill. It is a bipartisan bill that passed the Senate Judiciary Committee 18 to 0. It is a bill that last Congress passed under suspension in the House with the support of Republican Representative Lamar Smith and got through the House of Representatives. The House of Representatives, which tends to sometimes be a rather partisan place, was able to pass that bill. We cannot let this bill, when we are bleeding $3.6 billion in fraudulent tax return payments, die on the floor because my friend from Texas is trying again to put on these amendments.

I have no problem in having this amendment come up through the Finance Committee. By the way, Senator Hatch, the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee, said on the record during the Judiciary Committee hearing that S. 2067 should be considered first by the Finance Committee; that it was in the Finance Committee's jurisdiction. Yes, he voted for it in the end, but that is what he said. That is why this was problematic, and that amendment failed. We had a full discussion about this amendment.

In addition, there is a rulemaking on this issue, with 76,000 comments before the IRS.

That is the issue.

As for the other amendment that my friend from Texas has put out there as 2066, also considered by the Senate Judiciary Committee, also debated in the Judiciary Committee--we didn't close off the amendment. We had an amendment, we had a discussion, and that amendment failed by 10 to 8.

There are several laws, as we know, that are already on the books that could be useful in this case, and there may be further discussion of this in the future. But this bill has nothing to do with that. Just because it has the word ``tax'' in it doesn't mean it has anything to do with the IRS employees and the amendments that my friend from Texas put forward.

What is this bill about? This bill is about how, in 2012, identity thieves filed 1.8 million fraudulent tax returns, almost double the number confirmed in 2011. That is 1.8 million Americans having their tax ID stolen in 2012. There were another 1.1 million that slipped through the cracks, and our own U.S. Treasury is paying out $3.6 billion from fraudulent returns.

Our own Attorney General of the United States of America had his tax ID number stolen. If Eric Holder can have his tax ID number stolen--and they were able to catch the guy and prosecute him--what happens to the poor guy in Minnesota. That guy wasn't caught. What happens to the people that have their tax ID stolen and then they take years to be able to get back their identity.

This is why this bill went through the House of Representatives without messing around with these amendments. This is why this bill went through the Judiciary Committee, where we had the discussion and the votes on amendments.

All I am trying to do is take this 18-to-0 Judiciary vote--which I was very pleased that the Senator from Texas supported in the Judiciary Committee and said good words about this bill--all I am trying to do is to get this bill passed, instead of having a debate about an amendment that clearly should have gone through the Finance Committee, as stated by the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee.

It is time to get this bill passed. That is why I object to the amendments raised by the Senator from Texas and ask that this bill be passed.

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