I had a similar question. We filed a joint married return in 2018. Up thru 2018, we always had our state tax refund added to our income. In 2019, however, turbotax said it was not taxable. I think the reason is that we paid state and local taxes of roughly 12000, but could only deduct 10,000. Since our state tax refund was only about $1,500, IE less than the $2,000 that we were not able to deduct in 2018, in affect the money is considered to have been taxable in 2018 and so does not have to be added to taxable income in 2019. I believe that is how it is working in our case.
