What a yes vote endorsed
Recover COVID Unemployment Fraud in Banks Act
What this does
The bill directs the Secretary of Labor to designate a National Recovery Coordinator and convene a federal task force focused on pandemic-era unemployment payments. The task force coordinates with states to identify Federal pandemic unemployment payments that sit on prepaid debit cards held by banks under state contracts or that have passed to state unclaimed property offices, and it develops model processes and guidance for recovering payments found to be improper. The Secretary of Labor must reimburse states for administrative costs they incur from coordinating with the task force. The bill also extends to 10 years the statute of limitations for criminal prosecution and civil enforcement of specified fraud offenses tied to three pandemic unemployment programs. That longer window does not revive any case whose limitations period had already expired before the bill became law.
Passed the House by voice vote
How we know · 7 sourced claims
- The bill directs the Secretary of Labor to designate a National Recovery Coordinator and convene a federal task force focused on pandemic-era unemployment payments.Source: Sec. 2(a)
- The task force coordinates with states to identify Federal pandemic unemployment payments held on prepaid debit cards by banks under state contracts or transferred to state unclaimed property offices.Source: Sec. 2(b)(1)
- The task force develops model processes and guidance for recovering payments determined to be improper.Source: Sec. 2(b)(2)
- The Secretary of Labor must reimburse states for administrative costs incurred from coordinating with the task force.Source: Sec. 2(d)
- The bill extends to 10 years the statute of limitations for criminal prosecution and civil enforcement of specified fraud offenses tied to three pandemic unemployment programs.Source: Sec. 3(a)-(c)
- The longer limitations period does not apply to any case whose statute of limitations had already expired before enactment.Source: Sec. 3(a)(2), 3(b)(B), 3(c)(B)
- The measure addresses a single subject: the recovery and prosecution of fraud in pandemic-era unemployment programs.Source: Sec. 2; Sec. 3
Reported lobbying
At least
2
organizations named this measure in a lobbying filing.
A floor, not a total. Those organizations were counted by the client name on 3 quarterly reports filed by 2 registered lobbying firms in 2025 Q4 and 2026 Q2. The disclosure form takes a free text description of the issue, so an organization that lobbied this measure without naming it is not counted here.
The filings record that lobbying was reported on the measure. They carry no per-bill dollar figure and no position, so nothing here says how much was spent or which side an organization took.
The organizations named
- SERVICE EMPLOYEES INTERNATIONAL UNION CTW-CLC
- SMALL BUSINESS & ENTREPRENEURSHIP COUNCIL (SBE COUNCIL)
Listed as filed. They are every client name on the filings counted here.
From the LD-2 quarterly lobbying filings published at lda.gov by the Senate Office of Public Records. Read for 2025 Q1, 2025 Q2, 2025 Q3, 2025 Q4, 2026 Q1 and 2026 Q2. The pull came up 2 short in 2025 Q4 and 7 short in 2026 Q2 against the register's own count, so those quarters are the filings posted rather than every one filed. 2026 Q3 is still inside its filing window, so that quarter is only the filings posted so far.