Amending 2018 for Child Tax Credit (Federal & California)

[amrmahdi]

I'm amending my Federal return for 2018 to claim Child Tax Credit. I have few questions:

1) In the 1040X Explanation of Changes  I entered the following:
My child born in August 2018 with a valid SSN and lived with me throughout the year was not marked for the child tax credit

Do I need to enter additional details? It mentions adding any supporting documents, but I can't think of any. Are any documents required ?

2) Since there is no change to state, do I need to file a California state tax amend?

3) If yes, what do I enter in Part II Reason(s) for Amending ?

Thanks

[Texas Roger]

Did you claim the child as a dependent on your tax return? If you live apart from the other parent and allow that parent to claim the child as a dependent, then you are not eligible for the child tax credit. That goes to the parent who claims the child as a dependent.

[amrmahdi]

I'm married filling jointly with my wife. The mistake on the original return was that I answered the turbox tax question of how many month did the child with with you as 4 month, since my child was born in August. 

[Texas Roger · Accepted solution]

Now that you explained exactly what happened I understand why you must amend to indicate the child lived with you all year.  Your explanation should be adequate and you can just repeat it. You don't need to amend your state return if claiming your child as a dependent does not change it. 

[amrmahdi]

Is there a way in turbo tax to only amend the Federal tax, when I went through the amending process it still generated state documents.

[Texas Roger]

If the state documents did not change from what you originally filed, just don't mail them. 

[fanfare]

you might as well hold on to that return for a while 

IRS is not processing paper.

Why risk getting it lost?

You have three years to file that amendment. (two from now).