Democracy Dies in Darkness
Business

In reversal, IRS plans to let N.D. help tribes on child support payments

The IRS said it will permit a North Dakota program that aids Native American families trying to collect child support payments through garnishments of tax refunds.

By
May 16, 2024 at 6:16 p.m. EDT
The child support program on the Fort Belknap Reservation used to go through North Dakota’s state government to access child support payments garnished through federal tax refunds. (Tailyr Irvine for The Washington Post)
5 min

More than a year after pressuring North Dakota to stop helping Native American tribes collect child support payments, the IRS says it intends to let the state do so again.

The tax agency is working on a plan to allow North Dakota to resume submitting information on behalf of tribes so their families can receive child-support payments funded by garnishments of tax refunds, IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel told The Washington Post on Thursday. Werfel spoke to The Post days after it reported that hundreds of tribal families had lost access to those child support payments.