I had the same issue. I have no idea which of the following steps fixed the issue, but I got it to work.
Version: 2023 Turbo Tax Deluxe, Desktop Edition
Issue: After completing federal return, I could not start the state return because it said I needed to download the state. I clicked download, selected the states I needed (Maryland and Connecticut) paid the extra $40 and clicked download. Some stuff happened, it said it was all good, but upon clicking start return, it said I needed to download the states (infinite loop).
Failed attempts: Spoke to someone at Intuit for an hour. They were no help. There is no 2023 TTCleanStates.exe yet. They said the issue was that my state forms were not available yet (its Feb 9th). That was clearly a lie since an hour later I had fixed it myself. Then they said I needed to run a disk clean-up and defrag. I knew that wouldn't work. It didn't. They said to manually download the states and sent me a link. That didn't work. After hanging up with them I also tried uninstalling and reinstalling. That also did not work.
Investigation: My turbo tax was installed in C:Program Files>TurboTax>Individual 2023. In that folder there is a folder called "Forms". That folder should have contained the state download packages. For example, Maryland is a folder called "mdi_23". Those state folders were not in there because the states were not being properly installed (I found the logs for the state installer files and the last few lines of the error log indicate the install was not successful).
Sequence of things I did that ultimately resulted in it working:
1. Logged into myturbotax.intuit.com.
2. Clicked on "Intuit account" (bottom left of screen)
3. Clicked on "Products & Billing" (left pane)
4. Clicked "licenses and downloads" under "TurboTax Desktop 2023"
5. Re-downloaded all of the files (for me that was 3 files - the main software, plus two separate state downloads). I saved all three files in a one new folder on my desktop.
6. Double click/run the download for Connecticut. It does its thing and says it has installed (it hasn't)
7. Double click/run the download for Maryland. It does its thing and says it has installed (it hasn't)
8. Close turbo tax (if still open)
9. Uninstall Turbotax (control program -> add/remove programs)
10. Restart computer
11. Open the new folder on desktop (step 5). Double click/run the download for main Turbotax software
11a. Agree to the license agreement and click next
11b. Change the destination of the install to C:Program Files (x86), click next
12. The installer will run. Periodically it will ask about updates, I clicked "yes" to all/any questions during installation.
13. During the installation one of the status screens indicated it was updating Maryland, then the same for CT. This was the first time I had seen anything acknowledging states.
14. Install finished, opened Turbotax and voila, the states work!
**Interestingly, the software didn't end up in Program Files (x86) even though that is where I told windows to install it; however, I think this step is what made the difference.
This also happened last year. GET YOUR ACT TOGETHER Turbotax.
