The Coast Guard Combat-Injured Tax Fairness Act extends protections that were previously available only to military service members to Coast Guard personnel who have suffered combat-related injuries. Specifically, the bill amends a 2016 tax fairness law to ensure that Coast Guard members receive the same tax treatment on their severance payments as other combat-injured veterans, correcting what the legislation describes as improper tax withholding on these payments. The bill applies to Coast Guard members regardless of which federal department oversees the Coast Guard at any given time—currently the Department of Homeland Security, but historically the Department of Transportation or Navy. Federal officials have one year from the bill's enactment to identify and report all amounts that were improperly withheld from Coast Guard veterans and to ensure such withholding stops going forward. No specific funding amount is mentioned in the legislation, as it primarily addresses tax adjustments and administrative compliance rather than new spending.
Take Action
Your position
Add a comment
to comment on this bill.
Annotate the text
Highlight any passage on the Summary or Full Text tab to attach a note. Annotations appear on the Annotations tab.