S. 1773 — Tax Relief for Victims of Crimes, Scams, and Disasters Act

This section reinstates the deduction for personal casualty and theft losses by striking the limitation under IRC §165(h)(5) disallowing such deductions unless attributable to a federally declared disaster (in effect for tax years 2018-2025). The change applies to taxable years beginning after December 31, 2017.

This section extends the statute of limitations under IRC §6511(a) for filing claims for credit or refund attributable to personal casualty loss deductions under §165(c)(3)—which were generally suspended under §165(h)(5) for taxable years 2018 through 2025 except for qualified disaster losses—for any taxable year ending before January 1, 2025, to the due date (including extensions) for filing the tax return for the taxable year including the date of enactment. It also provides that the refund limitation of §6511(b)(2) does not apply to such claims. (Thus, eligible taxpayers may claim full refunds of overpaid tax for the full taxable year, regardless of when tax was paid.)