Andrew Appleby (Tennessee, SSRN) presents Privatized Tax Enforcement: State False Claims Acts and the Constitutional Limits of Outsourced Revenue Collection, 60 Ga. L. Rev. ___ (forthcoming 2026) at Georgia today as part of the Georgia Law Review Symposium: “Polarized Courts: The New Private Enforcement“

The proliferation of state false claims acts with qui tam enforcement mechanisms represents a profound shift in tax administration, fundamentally altering the traditional relationship between government enforcement agencies and private actors.  States are increasingly expanding the scope of their false claims acts to explicitly target state tax violations, creating an unprecedented system of private tax enforcement that operates parallel to—and often in tension with—traditional revenue collection systems.

This Article examines how state false claims acts are transforming tax enforcement by empowering private relators to pursue qui tam actions for state tax deficiencies, generating hundreds of millions in additional state revenue while simultaneously creating new forums for polarized enforcement strategies.  Drawing on the first wave of qui tam state tax cases across multiple jurisdictions, this Article demonstrates how state false claims acts have exposed significant vulnerabilities in privatized enforcement, including inconsistent application, conflicts of interest, opportunistic claim selection, and the erosion of governmental control over tax policy implementation. 

    This Article proposes reforms to state false claims act frameworks that preserve legitimate revenue recovery while addressing the significant administrative and policy deficiencies  raised by privatized tax enforcement.  With many states currently advancing legislative proposals to expand the scope of their false claims acts to include tax enforcement, this     Article’s analytical framework serves as a blueprint to guide state legislatures.