Yesterday IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said the tax agency follows the law "wherever it can." The comment came during a House Ways and Means Committee hearing on Capitol Hill about the disastrous and expensive Obamacare rollout. Koskinen was responding to a question from Republican Rep. Kevin Brady about ineligible individuals receiving Obamacare subsidies, who will eventually have to pay subsidies back to the IRS under the law.
Brady: Will you be following the law in that recapture?
Koskinen: Yes, wherever we can, we follow the law.
Brady: [Laughs] Wherever we can? I encourage you to follow the law in all instances.
Try using that excuse next time you fill out your tax returns or go through an audit.
Back in June the New York Times reported hundreds-of-thousands of people who are ineligible for Obamacare subsidies could be receiving them. Eventually if the system gets fixed, those people will have to pay the subsidies back.
The Obama administration is contacting hundreds of thousands of people with subsidized health insurance to resolve questions about their eligibility, as consumer advocates express concern that many will be required to repay some or all of the subsidies.
Of the eight million people who signed up for private health plans through insurance exchanges under the new health care law, two million reported personal information that differed from data in government records, according to federal officials and Serco, the company hired to resolve such inconsistencies.
The government is asking consumers for additional documents to verify their income, citizenship, immigration status and Social Security numbers, as well as any health coverage that they may have from employers. People who do not provide the information risk losing their subsidized coverage and may have to repay subsidies next April.
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