Bug? Federal Income not pulling in correctly to the State Return

[34npr]

In the return I'm working on, the 2025 Federal Total Income is less than the Federal Deductions, hence, the Federal Taxes owed is zero.  See first screenshot of the Federal Tax summary.

Then I started the Colorado state return. TT shows the "kick-started your CO taxes for you" screen where it summarizes the total Federal income as a NEGATIVE $21,574. See second screenshot.  I cannot figure out where this ($21,574) is coming from nor how to fix it. I assume it has something to do with netting the deductions from the total income, but I don't really care as it is wrong and must be a bug of some kind. Hey, Turbotax, if you're reading this would you please fix this ASAP? How are we supposed to report errors like this?

[MonikaK1]

Since you are using a Desktop version of TurboTax, you can switch to Forms Mode (click on Forms at the top menu when you are in Step-by-Step mode) and see how TurboTax has populated the various tax forms and worksheets using your entries.

In Forms Mode, look over your Form 1040. For any line item that doesn't look right, click inside the cell with that figure and you should see a magnifying glass icon. Click on the magnifying glass and TurboTax will take you to the form or worksheet where that dollar amount originated. 

Once you identify the source of the problem that led to the unexpected result of Federal deductions exceeding income entered, you can go back to Step-by-Step and revisit that section and change any entries if needed.

Another useful feature of Desktop products is the Tools menu at the top black bar. Click on Tools and you will see a drop-down menu of options including My Tax Data. When you choose My Tax Data, you can see the source of each entry on you return, and whether it was user-entered.

[34npr]

Thanks for the response. Here is what I figured out the next day when I called the customer support line. After nearly 2 hours of trying things with tech support in the background, they were able to clarify that

a.) the State of CO allows negative income to be pulled in from the federal return, and

b.)  the calculation of that income figure is occurring in the background, rather than pulled from the Fedeal form.

In this case, the calculation of the standard deduction, less income (without SSI since it was below the threshold) and without the new Senior credit deduction of $6k), resulted in the negative number I was seeing pulled into the State return. So, kudos to the support team for getting to the heart of it, but it all could of been made perfectly clear had the “show details” button on the State page actually shown all the details so one could understand how that number was calculated.

Due to the particular numbers I have in this return, the negative Federal income amount displayed at the beginning of the State refund process does not correlate to any number on the 1040 Federal form as it is calculated in the background by TurboTax. I don’t love that.