Clinton ‘Close’ to Ordering IRS to Collect Child Support : Payments: President says he doesn’t know any other way to obtain overdue funds from ‘deadbeat dads.’

President Clinton said Friday that he is on the verge of directing the Internal Revenue Service to collect delinquent child support payments from so-called “deadbeat dads.”

“It’s a big job,” Clinton said at an appearance at a day care center here. “We have not made a final decision, although I’ll tell you, I’m pretty close.”

While acknowledging that the IRS has long resisted becoming a collection agency for divorce courts, the President said: “I don’t know how we can do it any other way.”

With studies indicating that half of all children are potentially eligible for child support at some point before they are 18, the problem is a massive one.

Already, it is believed that $20 billion in back support is owed to 16 million U.S. children. By some estimates, the government could save $505 million in welfare payments over the next five years if parents could be forced to make their legally required support payments.

The idea of employing the IRS in the fight was first raised by Clinton during his presidential campaign last year. He also proposed several other means of attacking the problem, including reporting parents who fail to make child-support payments to collection agencies so they could not borrow money, establishing a “national deadbeat databank,” and making it a felony to cross state lines to avoid paying child support.

Although the President did not provide further details Friday, his general idea of using the IRS to collect the payments drew strong reservations from those who are familiar with the agency and the issue.

Lawrence B. Gibbs, who was IRS commissioner under former President Ronald Reagan, said that similar proposals were advanced in the past as a means of collecting funds that are owed a host of government programs, including student loans and farm payments. The general idea, he said, was that the overdue payments would be deducted from the refunds that taxpayers were expecting.

But Gibbs warned that such a plan would merely encourage taxpayers to reduce their payroll deductions, which can be changed by simply filling out a W-4 form.

“We’re one of the very few countries in the world that has been able to make withholding work,” Gibbs said. “Once you take somebody’s refund, guess what? They won’t have a refund next year and you’ll have to go chase them.”

Paul Hewitt, research director of the National Taxpayers Union, agreed, and noted that the idea raises additional questions involving civil liberties and privacy.

“It’s an unprecedented role, because the IRS currently just collects money for the government. It’s not a collection agency for private parties,” he said. “There’s a strong predilection in the United States against getting the Internal Revenue Service too involved in people’s private lives.

“It’s a scary idea,” he added. “It certainly creates the possibility of too much power in the hands of one agency.”

In individual cases, he said, courts already have the power to put a lien on tax refunds for a variety of reasons, including overdue child support payments.

In another appearance here before an audience of business leaders at the Atlanta Apparel Mart, Clinton also declared that with the first victories of his economic program in Congress “the process of renewal has begun, but only just begun.”

But he warned that he anticipates problems ahead because entrenched interests will seek to preserve the status quo.

“There are still guardians of gridlock in Washington who will fight fundamental change,” Clinton said, referring both to Republicans in the Congress and the capital’s legion of lobbyists. “Gridlock is not good for anyone except those who like to hear the gears squeal.”

Earlier in the day at a White House breakfast, Clinton praised Democratic House leaders for acting “with unbelievable dispatch” on his plan that combines deficit reduction with new spending for a variety of social programs.

Clinton and Vice President Al Gore are making trips around the country about once a week to sell the program directly to voters and to put pressure on balky lawmakers. Clinton political aides chose Georgia for the President on Friday at least in part because influential Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has signaled his displeasure with the size and pace of the defense cuts that are being used to help finance Clinton’s new spending programs.

In Atlanta, Clinton praised Democratic House members from Georgia who voted for his plan Thursday and offered mild thanks to Nunn for helping fight Republican efforts to derail the program in the Senate.

But Nunn was noticeably absent from the Atlanta event. A Nunn spokesman said the senator was invited but was kept in Washington by pressing Senate business.