Episode Details

The return gets rejected because someone has already claimed your children. Nancy Rossner says the reaction she meets at that point is usually a belief that nothing can be done, and that this belief is wrong: there is a process, it works, and there is free legal help for it in almost every state.

Nancy Rossner is an attorney and the executive director of the Community Tax Law Project, a low-income taxpayer clinic in Richmond, Virginia that has been running for a little over thirty years and serves the whole state. It is part of a national network of clinics funded to provide free legal services to people with IRS or state tax agency problems, and her clinic gives advice as well as full representation, so a question does not have to become a case. The national list lives in IRS Publication 4134. This is her return visit to the show.

Nancy lays out how taxes get used as a weapon after a separation: filing first to claim children the other parent is entitled to claim, filing as married jointly without consent, and using a former partner's Social Security number to open a business or take out loans. She explains the paper-filing route when an electronic return bounces, what the IRS letter that follows will ask for, and why keeping copies matters even when your living situation is unsettled. She also details the identity protection PIN program, which is open to every taxpayer with no proof of abuse required, along with its real-world friction: a fresh number each year sent to your address on file, identity verification through a third-party service, and no way out of the program once enrolled.

The second half is about liability. Signing a joint return makes you responsible for the tax owed, including tax assessed later if the return is audited, whether or not you earned anything. Nancy explains innocent spouse relief, the three separate subsections it lives under, and why the IRS weighs domestic violence and signing under duress heavily while treating deliberate incuriosity as no defense. She and Lisa then talk about getting a family lawyer and a tax attorney to coordinate before the agreement is signed: who claims which child in which year, what happens if support goes unpaid, who carries any tax debt, and the fact that the earned income tax credit cannot be traded away even when the dependent credit can. She closes with free filing options and a change in the law that opens that credit to some separated spouses filing on their own.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Where to find a free low-income taxpayer clinic in your state, and what they will answer without taking your case
• What to do when your return is rejected because someone already claimed your children
• The IP PIN program: how it blocks a fraudulent filing, and the catches to know first
• Why to pull your credit report on a schedule when an ex has your Social Security number
• What signing a joint return commits you to, even with no income of your own
• Innocent spouse relief: how duress is weighed, and why not looking is not a defense
• Agreement language on who claims the kids, who owes any tax debt, and unpaid support
• The child-related credit that cannot be handed to the other parent, whatever the decree says

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Free tax clinics, and the IRS publication that lists them
3:00 Filing first to claim your kids, and filing jointly without your consent
5:00 When your return is rejected: the paper route and what to keep
8:00 The identity protection PIN program, and its catches
12:00 Credit reports, and businesses and loans opened in your name
15:00 What signing a joint return actually commits you to
22:00 Innocent spouse relief, duress, and the head-in-the-sand problem
26:00 Getting your family lawyer an