{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://clayhiggins.house.gov/2025/12/10/higgins-legislation-to-end-1-3-billion-in-improper-government-payments-passes-committee/", "Higgins\u2019 Legislation to End $1.3 Billion in Improper Government Payments Passes Committee", "2025-12-10", "2025", "2025-12", "Republican", "House", "LA", "Clay Higgins", "H001077", "clayhiggins.house.gov", "clayhiggins", "https://clayhiggins.house.gov/category/press-releases/", "scraper", "Washington, D.C.- Congressman Clay Higgins\u2019 (R-LA) legislation, H.R. 2716, the Ending Improper Payments to Deceased People Act, passed through the House Ways and Means Committee during a markup today.\n\nThe bill would ensure that deceased people are removed from government payment rolls by permanently requiring the Social Security Administration to share the \u201cDeath Master File\u201d with the Treasury Department\u2019s \u201cDo Not Pay\u201d system. In 2023 alone, the federal government sent $1.3 billion to deceased people. Read the bill text here.\n\n\u201cThis legislation will immediately save American taxpayers billions of dollars. It\u2019s unacceptable that the federal bureaucracy has grown to be so outrageously wasteful,\u201d said Congressman Higgins. \u201cAs a fiscal conservative, I\u2019m eager to see this bill, which reduces wasteful spending without expanding the size of the government, signed into law, and I\u2019d like to thank the House Ways and Means Committee and Chairman Jason Smith for propelling this crucial effort forward.\u201d", 1, "2026-03-31T05:33:41Z", "2026-03-31T05:34:51Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://clayhiggins.house.gov/2025/12/10/higgins-legislation-to-end-1-3-billion-in-improper-government-payments-passes-committee/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.8779196068644524, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}