For the 2021 tax return using the Married Filing Joint filing status, you are allowed to deduct up to $600 in cash contributions to charity without claiming itemized deductions.
If you are using the Married Filing Joint filing status AND using the standard deduction:
As you go through your Federal return and you have entered your charitable contributions, you will not see any additional questions regarding your inputs. If your state return also allows you to deduct charitable contributions, then the amounts you entered will be taken into account on your state return.
After you have finished your state return and you are getting ready to file, when you run the final Review, you will probably see this message:
1040/1040SR Wks: Charitable Contributions: Charitable contributions has an unacceptable value
You will also see a place at the top of the screen for Charitable contributions with '300' in the box. Below that box, you can see your Form 1040 line 12a which shows the amount of your cash contributions that you already entered.
If your line 12a is greater or equal to $600, enter '600' in the box at the top of the screen.
If your line 12a is less than $600, enter your line 12a amount in the box at the top of the screen.
After changing the input at the top of the screen to the correct value, proceed through any other errors that may pop up and then move forward to file your return. It is very important that you do not revisit any other section of your return before you file or the change may not be retained or able to be changed a second time.
See the screenshot below for reference:
"Thanks" for the "work around". I already do it that way. It did not take long to figure it out. The problem is the $600 should not be there to begin with when I itemize.
I suggest you fix the bug as a better solution. Which is what I really had in mind instead of getting advice on spoofing the program.
The on-line (browser-based) version doesn't allow me to edit forms directly. I assume you are using the desktop version. I hope the browser version will eventually allow direct editing as this has been a useful feature in the past when I encountered issues with the software.