No, you cannot claim your daughter. You cannot do anything about the grandmother claiming the child, either.
The grandmother is actually allowed to claim the child, if she lives with the child, and has a higher income than the custodial parent. See full rules below. The most important rule is what relative the child lives with.
There are two types of dependents, "Qualifying Children"(QC) and
standard ("Qualifying Relative" in IRS parlance even though they
don't have to actually be related). There is no income limit for a QC but there
is an age limit, a relationship test and a residence
test. Only a QC qualifies the taxpayer for the Earned Income Credit, the
Child Tax Credit. They are interrelated but the rules are different for each.
A child closely related to a taxpayer can be a “Qualifying Child (QC)”
dependent, regardless of the
child's income, if:
1.
He is under age 19, or under 24 if a full time
student for at least 5 months of the year, or
is totally & permanently disabled
2.
He did not provide more than 1/2 his own
support
3.
He lived with the relative for more than half the year
4.
He is younger than the relative (not applicable
for a disabled child)
5.
If the
child meets the rules to be a qualifying child of more than one person, you
must be the person entitled to claim the child as a qualifying child (this
essentially means that you have the parent’s permission to claim the child, if the child also lived with the parent more than
half the year)
6.
If the parents of a
child can claim the child as a qualifying child but no parent so claims the
child, no one else can claim the child as a qualifying child unless that
person's adjusted gross income (AGI) is higher than the highest AGI of any of
the child's parents who can claim the child.
