The up-to-date database resides in Part 2 (link at the bottom of this page).
Above is a link to data we are compiling on Relinquishments and Renunciations — a work in progress. This corresponds with the Consulate Report Directory (in sticky post below), tracking individual experiences for each Consulate, along with a timeline chart.
Note: We are using numbers instead of blog names for this public posting so there will be no compromise of private information. Your facts will help give a snapshot of relinquishment and renunciation activity and where that occurs.
Please submit information in the comments here (or someone can contact you privately). Thanks for all your help on this.
COMMENTS ARE CLOSED FOR Relinquishment and Renunciation Data (as reported on Isaac Brock), Part 1.
Part 2 is now open for your comments. Thank you.
Congratulations, Myst! Welcome to freedom! I’m glad that your expatriation meeting went smoothly and your CLN arrived relatively quickly. Thanks very much for the details about your CLN timing and also for your report on your Montréal meeting.
@Myst,
Thanks so much for your report of receipt of your CLN, 2-1/2 month turnaround. We appreciate, and I’m sure will the Montreal Consulate, your high marks for their service. I’m off to update the R&R database with the two most recent, yours and Cir’s in Vanacouver. Congratulations!!
Congratulations on your freedom, Myst! Although my renunciation in 2012 took eight months, it is encouraging to see that many are being processed much quicker recently. I’m anticipating my inclusion on the next “name and shame” list which is due out soon.
*Way to go Myst! Really excellent turnaround time by the powers that be too.
A sad story of an ex-pat American entrepreneur who was forced to throw in the towel and return to the Homeland. His crime? Guilty of living abroad while selling American products.
GenevaLunch (blog): “Packing up, going home: one US citizen in Switzerland vents his anger”
http://genevalunch.com/editor-s-notepad/2013/01/29/packing-up-going-home-one-us-citizen-in-switzerland-vents-his-anger/
From the article:
“For the last 25 years I have been busting open niche markets for American products, contributing to lowering the trade deficit, developing new markets for US producers, creating employment for my brethren back home, increasing the tax base where they live.”
“Two months ago my bank informed me that I could no longer make wire transfers to the states. That being the case how will I pay my suppliers?”
“This is forcing me to shut down my 100% legal and tax compliant operation abroad, building new long term niche markets for US products, and to relocate back to Vermont, where I intend to farm.”
*Congratulations to you, too, Myst.
My CLN has just arrived in the mail today, too, stamped approved in Washington on January 10. I hope Myst’s and my simultaneous CLN deliveries indicate that a bureaucratic log jam in DC has been broken. Mine came with a cover letter, copies of the DS forms I signed at the consulate, and my very old, expired US passport, but nothing pertaining to other US government agencies.
For the Isaac Brock database, my CLN application was done through an appointment at the Toronto consulate last June — total time including waiting time for the appointment was 8 months of bafflement, anger, and worry, relieved by occasional bouts of humorous ridicule of the process. I commiserate with all others who are going through similar ordeals and hope my comments here at Brock have been helpful to them.
I’m now referring to the CLN as a Certificate of Leaving the Nightmare — see my posting at http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2012/02/06/ex/comment-page-1/#comment-165597 earlier today. As I indicated there, I’m still not sure if having the CLN in hand will keep the zombies at bay. I’m still too paranoid about that to use my real name here, even though I know the zombies can track me down if they really want to try. It will be an interesting continuing experiment to see if they really do try, despite my long-ago relinquishment and modest financial situation. Next I will be looking for my name on the quarterly Federal Register list.
Thanks to everyone at the Isaac Brock Society for help, advice, and moral support. When the time is right, I hope to join a celebratory party at some Toronto pub.
Absolutely terrific news — CLNs from West, East and Middle East! Congratulations to Cir in Vancouver, Myst in Montreal and AnonAnon in Toronto. “Certificates of Leaving the Nightmare” — love that and love that CLNs seem to be coming faster now. Although, sorry you had such a long anxious wait, AnonAnon. I’m afraid to jinx things for my husband but maybe once his Canadian citizenship comes through it won’t be as long as we had previously calculated before he has a CLN in hand. (Fingers crossed.)
Congratulations, AnonAnon,
The conclusion of Escape from the Orwellian Zombie Rabbit Hole. Congratulations on the receipt of your CLN (Certificate of Leaving the Nightmare).
Can I also post the date of your CLN for the Renounce & Relinquish database (no name) or, if not, just the year? We really value your (and everyone’s) contribution for that database and the Consulate Report Directory as a resource for others finding their way through the maze.
Hope a great bunch of you who renounced or relinquished in Toronto WILL get together for a celebration at some point, it would be nice if we all could in our different parts of the country — or world. All the best!
*Sure, calgary411, my CLN was signed at the consulate in July 2012, with expatriation date of November 1979.
Thanks to you and others for the congratulations.
@AnonAnon.
Updated and I’m going to post the latest revision right now. Thanks again!
Congratulations, AnonAnon!
Great to hear your Certificate of Leaving the Nightmare arrived! I’m a ’79, too, and seeing that date on mine was like, “Finally! Reality is back!” What an absurd nightmare. Glad yours is over, too!
Thanks very much for sharing your timeline info and the detailed report of your consulate meeting last summer.
*Thanks for your congratulations, pacifica777.
I’m interested in organizing a pub party for CLN recipients and their guests in the Toronto area when the time is right. April 15 seems like a good month and day for it. Probably it’s too soon for it this year. 2014 would likely be better.
A party would be way more fun and less expensive, of course, than filing pointless IRS paperwork would have been. Admission would be by CLN for a guest and friend. I would like to have it in a pub that features Canadian craft beers and wines. It would be good to have enough people eligible to attend it that it might attract some press coverage. I wonder if we could have a couple hundred attendees by April 15, 2014.
Does anyone else have suggestions about it?
@AnonAnon
Sounds like a great idea to me! Presumably it would be open to anyone who wants to travel to Toronto for this, who has a CLN? There are several in Ottawa who might be interested, for example, which isn’t all that far from Toronto, and some of us have family or friends in Toronto and could combine this with a visit with them too. There might even be people from further afield who might be interested.
Also by 2014 we certainly should know what our Canadian government has or hasn’t done re an IGA, and depending on what did or didn’t happen, there might be some further political activism or publicity that could be appropriate in conjunction with this event. Particularly as we’d be coming closer to the next federal election. Worth keeping in mind IMO.
Perhaps a way to get below the 2 million covered expatriate threshold, gift some away before renouncing.
http://blog.ustaxonline.com/2013/01/14/gift-and-estate-tax-exemption-to-rise/
AnonAnon: What a great idea, and thank you for it! As one in the far west, I’ shall be there one way or another, if only in spirit.
Cir
@Anon,Anon,
What a marvelous idea. I would fly to Toronto from Vancouver for such an event – and I do have friends that I could stay with while there.
Of course, at the ‘snails’ pace’ the Vancouver consulate moves, who knows whether I will have my CLN by April 15, 2014. After all, they are still requiring 2 appointments and those appointments are MORE THAN ONE YEAR APART!!!!!!!!
One thing I am 100% sure of is that by 2014 I will most definitely be one year older than I am now and with this stress of waiting, I could look and feel 10 years older.
@Cir,
I am not sure I congratulated you on your CLN. If not, a very very sincere congratulations. Sure wish I had gotten into Vancouver just a couple of weeks earlier – perhaps, I too, would have my CLN.
@AnonAnon,
That is a great idea! I’ll start our special piggy bank fund for travel from Calgary and perhaps some kind of vacation built around that party if it works.
*Tiger: Many thanks. Your story is so appalling, I am thinking maybe AnonAnon”s party should centre around doing something really meaningful (choose your preposition here) the Vancouver Consulate.
Cir
*It seems that a lot of people support the idea of a CLN party sometime around April 15 next year. (It might be best to have it on a weekend, rather than on the actual 15th.) I proposed it for Toronto, but of course it would be open to anyone in the world with a US CLN.
Another idea might be to have simultaneous parties in several cities, all linked by Skype. The more people we can get involved, the more publicity we can generate. We could invite some Canadian MPs, and maybe even the US ambassadors to the various countries in which the party sites will be located. Let’s keep working on the idea.
*With some luck, I might be able to fit it into my schedule. I would prefer Bermuda, though. Have already been to Toronto a few of times. 🙂 The problem with Bermuda, though, is that Canadians would have to do a US stopover.
*@AnonAnon, You can count me in!! I hope to have all this behind me by 2014. And what a celebration it will be. Oh Yes!! It will be Happy Days!!
@Jospeh Zernik, well done. Now that’s sorted out hopefully your CLN will be on its way soon.
If you’re aiming for around the 15th April 2014 guys/gals just remember that Easter is the following weekend; Good Friday is on the 18th.
*I am happy to report that I received my CLN on January 23rd. (I am number three on the list of renunciants for Stockholm.) It was dated for December 4th, which is when I had my second appointment, and approved by the State Department on December 19th. I am not sure if any of you have noticed, but there is an approver ID in the State Department’s stamp area. Mine ended with EUR, so I assume that there are different employees/groups of employees assigned to different geographic areas, which would explain why the turnaround is so quick for some countries and not others. Either they have not spread the work evenly among their team members, or some are not as efficient as others. The CLN was accompanied by a copy of my oath and statement of understanding. I did not receive any tax forms nor did they return my cancelled passport. I was a bit surprised by the latter, but do not have a use for the passport other than as a “souvenir”, so it doesn’t really matter.
Thanks again to everyone here for providing useful information and a listening ear!
@ AnonAnon,
What a great idea, a CLN party! I’d be delighted to go to Toronto, for sure, and I really like your idea of simultaneous parties around the world.