Illegal Aliens, ID Theft, and A Personal Resurrection

Someone on Ricochet posted a link to a brilliantly written Mark Steyn article. If you haven’t read it, I think you should. Among various frauds discussed is half a billion dollars allocated to Internews Network, an NGO headquartered in an abandoned building. This is a trope of movies and TV, but in real life, it is jarring to see it actually happening with one’s tax money.

Steyn, in turn, linked to an excellent article by Mark Hemingway and Ben Weingarten, titled:

Willful Blindness: Feds Ignore Illegal Alien ID Theft Plaguing Americans as U.S. Coffers Fill.

The historic surge of illegal immigrants across America’s southern border is fueling a hidden crime spree few in Washington seem willing or able to address: widespread identity theft victimizing unwitting Americans perpetrated by migrants who need U.S. credentials to work...

The incentive for illegals to steal someone else’s Social Security Number is to gain broader employment opportunities.

A telling indication of the scope of the criminality is provided by a little-known government accounting book, the Social Security Administration’s Earnings Suspense File (ESF). It reflects the earnings of employees whose W-2 wage and tax statements have names and Social Security numbers that do not match official records. The total logged in the file has increased tenfold from $188.9 billion at the dawn of the millennium to $1.9 trillion in 2021.

One might think that with duplicate SSNs being used, along with employers filing W-2s on all workers, it would be easy for Uncle Sam to apprehend ID thieves. But…

This identity-related crime is providing a windfall for the U.S. government. A 2017 study from the conservative Federation for American Immigration Reform found that the federal government collects about $22 billion annually in tax receipts from illegal aliens, with the bulk going toward Social Security ($12.6 billion) and Medicare ($5.9 billion) – programs from which noncitizens are ineligible to receive benefits.

The article goes on to detail government indifference to this crime because of… oh, just read the article. Which brings me to my favorite subject - me!

A couple decades ago, when interest rates were low, I decided to refinance my mortgage. Things went smoothly until I died. That’s what the credit bureaus reported, anyway. I had apparently expired in California, despite having never lived there, and so my loan application was rejected.

I was not the source of that misinformation but the burden was on me to correct it. The credit bureaus had, in true Big Brother fashion, gathered my personal information, without my knowledge or permission. They had also mixed in data from someone else who died while using my SSN. They were peddling this false information to banks for profit and, in the process, destroyed my credit. And they weren’t interested in correcting their mistake.

I contested this but the credit bureaus were indifferent and I didn’t make much progress. Several people suggested I contact Social Security to establish my ongoing animation, and so I visited a nearby SS office. I delivered my tale of woe to the agent, who seemed bemused, having never spoken to a dead SSN holder before. But she was helpful, checked the computer, and gave me a letter stating I was still making payments into the Social Security trust fund. That letter enabled me to get the financing I desired.

A few years later it was time to trade in my old vehicle. I selected a new ride, and the dealership was naturally eager to help me finance the outstanding balance. But the loan officer came back with bad news: I was still dead. I made it plain that I was not, and I was in no mood to prove it again. Being a resourceful guy, he found a bank that loaned to dead people (not really) and I left with a new Toyota.

I would like to repeat that the credit bureaus were indifferent to my situation and happy to keep selling my inaccurate credit report. Likewise, even though I was in annual contact with the IRS, they had never complained. The Social Security Administration was oblivious. One would think that red flags would have popped up, but if they did, they were ignored. And the aforementioned article lays out the “reasons.”

A few years later I financed another small loan for a car, and my resurrection was acknowledged. No one mentioned my previous demise.

The article mentions victims of ID theft who suffered far more than I. See Marcus Calvillo. Government indifference to ID theft is horrifying. I have hope that may soon change.