A death may not be recorded without clear and convincing evidence
To improve coordination between Federal and State agencies and the Do Not Pay working system, section 2, Sec. 2.
Written by .
A death may not be recorded without clear and convincing evidence
The document says “may not”Who acts: Commissioner of Social SecurityHow: statuteSec. 2 in the PDF
What the document says
“The Commissioner of Social Security may not record a death to a record that may be provided under this section for any individual unless the Commissioner of Social Security has found it has clear and convincing evidence to support that the individual should be presumed to be deceased.”
Added as paragraph (12) of section 205(r) of the Social Security Act by the same instruction that replaces paragraph (11). It sets a condition on recording a death to a record that may be provided under that section: a finding of clear and convincing evidence to support that the individual should be presumed to be deceased. The Act does not define clear and convincing evidence, and it does not state which records may be provided.
What the document actually says
“The Commissioner of Social Security may not record a death to a record that may be provided under this section for any individual unless the Commissioner of Social Security has found it has clear and convincing evidence to support that the individual should be presumed to be deceased.”
That sentence, in plain words
A person is not marked dead on these records right away. There must be strong, clear proof first. Only then can the mark be made.
What this is about
The mark matters because it can stop a payment. So the law sets a test that must be met. The law does not spell out what counts as proof.
No action is recorded against this proposal. That is not evidence that none has been taken, and nobody has yet read it against the record. See what the tracker does not yet cover.
Ending Improper Payments to Deceased People Act, Public Law 119-77, sec. 2, 140 Stat. 745 (2026). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/PLAW-119publ77/html/PLAW-119publ77.htm
This page
“A death may not be recorded without clear and convincing evidence,” Ending Improper Payments to Deceased People Act, section 2, Sec. 2. Read the Mandate, https://readthemandate.org/ending-improper-payments-deceased-people-act/proposal/sec02-clear-and-convincing-evidence/ (retrieved October 10, 2026).
Cite the document when the claim is about what the document says. Cite this page when the indexing, the wording or the record of what has happened is what is being relied on.
How to Read This Page
The quotation is the document's own words, exactly as printed, checked against the page
number against the Act itself before publishing. The paragraph underneath is our summary,
not the document's words. So is the plain English version, which is why it sits beside the
quotation rather than replacing it.
