The phone rang this morning. For a few minutes, my actual phone number was on the blog, by mistake, and one very quick reader, Dianne, phone me from Winterpeg. Not long ago, she learned that the United States still considers her to be an American, even though she hasn’t believed herself to be American since the age of 18. So I asked her to write up her story so that the Isaac Brock Society could help her sort out this issue. Here it is:
I was born in the USA in 1957 to two Canadian parents. My father was working on his Phd there and they returned to Canada when I was weeks old. Since then I have never lived in the US. I do not have a US passport or social security number. I have never voted in the US and do not own property there. I have lived and worked my entire life in Canada. It was my understanding when I turned 18 (in 1975) that if I did not actively seek American citizenship I would be considered only Canadian. I was shocked to hear that the IRS may consider me American. I am interested in finding our how to clarify that I am not an American citizen.
@Dianne, Sorry for rambling on about my situation.
Dianne, I think you will get alot of good advise here.. I glad you came to this site. You have lots of friends here.
@saddened123;
Re: “I wake up 10 times or more a nite, it is more than a nitemare..it is hell…” That’s not rambling. Don’t apologize.
You’re not alone. I will try to think of you when I’m awakened by this too! Hang in there.
@Badger, Thank you for your kind words. I appreciate it.
Dianne. Don’t worry if voting in a provincial vs. federal election is ‘enough’. You are Canadian. Rest easy. Forget about it. Sleep well. They can’t and won’t bother you.
The tale of Tiger’s university friend, about ten comments above in this thread, reminds me of this occasional Catch-22 PhilDickian one-more-twist thought:
Over the past decade or two, the United States has created a nightmare for itself and its deemed persons, by intricating into a situation where no one can be allowed to relinquish or renounce because all are under duress and therefore cannot make a compulsion-free decision. If anyone is allowed to exit, the exit cannot be real, because the way back can always be reopened with a subsequent claim of having felt compelled …
The flip side of the Hotel California syndrome, if you will. You can always check back in, no matter what. Even if the country isn’t Canada and you’re not Conrad Black.
I think its criminal the way that the US changed its nationality law to automatically give citizenship back to those who lost it. Mass forced re-naturalisation should not occur in a democratic country.
When I was born I obtained Belgian-Italian citizenship jus sanguinis. At the time Italy expressly forbade dual citizenship except for cases like me when you were born with it. In 1992 the constitution changed and all restrictions were removed and Italian emigrants who had acquired another citizenship anywhere in the world were given a 10 year window to reapply for their citizenship through the nearest Italian embassy to have it reinstated. If they didn’t apply they weren’t forced to obtain it and if they missed they deadline, well, they missed the deadline then.
PS Has anyone else noticed how the US also seems to be the only country that, if you renounce, has absolutely no provision for allowing you reacquire the citizenship under preferential conditions? Off the top of my head Italy and Canada allow former citizens to reacquire citizenship after one year’s residence, and the UK even just lets former citizens reapply without any residence requirements whatsoever. I mention this merely because I imagine that, assuming the US dumps FATCA, FBAR and citizenship-based taxation in the future some renunciants might want to reacquire it but they won’t have any way of doing so (Not that I would want it back at this point personally…)
Try to get citizenship back? Never!
The door hit me in the arse too hard for that.
Uncle Sam: once a tyrant, always a tyrant.
As far as the US is concerned, voting in a foreign election makes no distinction as to whether it was a Federal, provincial or municipal election. They are all “foreign” as far as the US is concerned.
Roger wrote: “@Petros, does the
“cannot be retroactively applied to detriment of the wishes of a citizen. It is a constitutional right” apply to all laws, or just to citizenship laws?”
The Constitution of the United States prohibits Congress from passing ex post facto laws. The basic premise is that no law may be retroactively applied to detriment of the citizen. No one complains when the law changes in their favor. Citizenship would seem to be an advantage, so Congress believes it’s doing you a favor by reinstating your citizenship. But it is not a advantage, it is a disadvantage, and that is why it is an ex post facto law and unconstitutional. It is a violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that recognizes the right of each person to change their nationality.
Roger wrote:
I think that’s correct. Also voting is just part of a total argument: job with Crown Corporation with a strong desire to relinquish American citizen, voting in Canada, became Canadian at birth or a little later, but before the age of 18, never resided in the US, never worked in the US, never voted in the United States, never travelled on a US passport, entered the United States consistently only on a Canadian passport, parents were visa students (temporary residents of the United States- not permanent residents–I think this is an important aspect of the argument); never paid taxes in the United States; never registered any children as Americans; never tried to ever claim any benefits of US citizenship. This means in a preponderance of evidence type argument, any reasonable person will acknowledge that Dianne exited definitively the Hotel California five decades ago.
@all
I see that there is a lot of discussion about the U.S. “retroactively making former U.S. citizens, U.S. citizens”. I haven’t read all the comments (we are now in the 80s and counting), but here is what I think the situation with this is:
The law gives U.S. citizens who had their citizenship taken from them by the U.S., the option, but not the obligation to get/take it back.
Here, is the reasoning.
Prior to the 1986 amendments to S. 349 of INA, the expatriating acts resulted in the loss of citizenship as long as the act was performed voluntarily. The intention did not matter. So, lots and lots of people lost their citizenship. Many of those who lost their citizenship considered this to be a great loss (and it was at that time). Now, you need to remember why the law was changed in 1986. It was NOT because the U.S. was trying to be nice. It was because of a couple of Supreme Court decisions that specifically said that the U.S. could not terminate citizenship if the person did not intend to relinquish it. This decision followed from the 14th amendment. Now, the 14th amendment has been around for a long time. When the Supreme Court held that the 14th amendment protected one’s citizenship, the court affirmed a fact that was always true (as a matter of constitutional law), but that had not been acknowledged by the U.S. government. This led to the 1986 amendments to the law. But, it also meant that the U.S. had illegally terminated the citizenship of a large number of people. But, now remember that that the court ruled that a person has a right to either retain or relinquish citizenship.
Therefore, what I understand to be happening is that:
Those of you who had your citizenship terminated by the U.S., because we did NOT consider your intention, can get your citizenship back (meaning that we will continue to recognize that you are a citizen). But, if your position is that, at the time you performed the expatriating Act, that you were NOT intending to retain your U.S. citizenship, that you have lost your citizenship.
So, what does all this mean? You are NOT being automatically made a U.S. citizen. But, you have the option to continue to be recognized as a U.S. citizen if you want.
I am trying to make the point again and again, that the first step for anybody is a consideration of your citizenship status. Obviously the cross border professionals want you to be a citizen. This also a very precise area of law and you need to work with a lawyer with a long term view and understanding of U.S. citizenship law.
Unfortunately, many lawyers with that “long term view”, have taken that “long term view” to their graves.
Reblogged this on Renounce U.S. Citizenship – Be Free.
@ renounce This is the way I see it too. However, there are couple difficulties to overcome: (1) border guards are telling people that they are citizens, and must therefore travel to US only on a passport. This is like the retroactive reinstatement of citizenship. (2) the Consulate/State Department are also being uncooperative when the person goes in and say, Hey I lost my citizenship years ago. They will sometimes deny that the person relinquished; we know of at least one case where a person went into a consulate and was harassed and told that she was still a citizen, even though she lost her US citizenship several decades ago. Therefore, it becomes a citizenship war.
Thus, I think a thread like this is extremely helpful to some, so that they can get create legal arguments how they may prove they are no longer US citizens, so that when they enter the consulate they have the best chance for being able to convince State that they have legally relinquished.
I consider border guards and consular officers to be like airplane pilots: they know how to operate the plane, but they are not engineers. The laws are the domain of legal arguments. The officers enforce the law based on their training and operational manuals, but they are not experts on the citizenship law. We need to arm every Brocker with a knowledge of the law and their rights, so that these bureaucrats stop stripping them of their international and constitutional rights.
@Renounce – very cogent analysis. Thank you. I agree with you completely. My only concern, really, is with FATCA and the banks. I do not believe the iRS would ever find me or if they did, come after me. However, my Canadian passport shows me as being born in the US. If all of that crap the US is growing comes to fruition, I may have to have something that proves to my banks that I am not a US citizen. I think, therefore, that I may need a (backdated) CLN. And that’s where I think I need to have my arguments lined up, and why I’m digging into the quagmire of the history of US citizenship laws and how I have to have lost that decades ago for many reasons.
@Saddened, I feel for you, I really do. When I first heard about all of this back in early February, I was the same. A constant lowgrade thrumming that could flare into a full grown panic attack at any mention of the US. I had trouble falling asleep. Trouble staying asleep. Trouble thinking about anything other than this. It affected my work, it affected my home life, it affected my friendships (can anyone say ‘obsession’?) For me, I discovered, it calmed down when I made my decision that as a Canadian I will not be bowing down and presenting my neck to the US. Come what may, I will not be filing anything. In an odd way, I’d almost welcome the IRS to challenge me so that I could fight back openly. However, as I’ve mentioned previously on other streams, right now I’m keeping a low profile for the sake of my family and their wishes. You have a difficult road to follow, and I hope you know I wish you the best with that.
If you believed that you had lost your citizenship and then now believe that you hadn’t really lost it, but in fact you really had, it would seem very important that you don’t go and do something like vote in a US election thinking you can change things by voting!
Imagine this to be a conversation between a US expat and a US border guard and have a chuckle:
@outragedcanadian and saddened, I feel under attack and betrayed by a country that I once had some pride in. Although it’s difficult, don’t let them take your health too. Talk to your doctor (take advantage of what we’re envied for south of the border), but don’t take your BP while doing so. Mine was through the roof and I’m now having to monitor it. I think that a great many of us are depressed over this. Brock is great therapy, but we are the converted.
@All
I hope we’re not all going to be stuck for life at FIRST BASE! or is it second. I don’t know ==> THIRD BASE 🙂
@all
Most of you are Canadians, have been Canadians for a long time and will die as Canadians. When you opened your bank accounts nobody asked you for your citizenship. And even if they had you would have answered “Canadian”.
Now, before I go further, I want to make clear that I believe and would encourage everybody to be compliant with the law. But these law apply to U.S. citizens. They are not written to apply to anybody born in the U.S.
You are a Canadian citizen and the banks have no reason to think that you are anything but. You have no reason, at least at the present time, to worry at all.
Now what you need to do is act as the Canadian citizen that you are and only as the Canadian citizen that you are. Furthermore, if you are not a U.S. citizen (and I am talking to you), you don’t do anything that is required of U.S. citizens. This means no voting, passports, tax compliance or anything else.
At the border: I am aware that border guards have asked people born in the U.S., where there U.S. passport is. But, I have not heard of anybody (although there may be one or two) who have been denied entry to the U.S. because they did not have a U.S. passport. Now, please read carefully. Not all non-U.S. citizens are the same relative to the U.S.
Canadian citizens do NOT require a VISA to enter the U.S. In other words, under U.S. law they can enter.
Now, let’s get in the head of a border guard. He has two rules in front of him.
Rule 1. § 53.1
Passport requirement; definitions.
(a) It is unlawful for a citizen of the United States, unless excepted under 22 CFR 53.2, to enter or depart, or attempt to enter or depart, the United States, without a valid U.S. passport.
(b) For purposes of this part “United States” means “United States” as defined in section 215(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, as amended (8 U.S.C. 1185(c) ).
http://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/22/53.1
Rule 2. A Canadian citizen can be admitted without a VISA.
Now, the border guard can (and I believe in most cases will) apply rule 2. Why? The rule is easier to understand and the U.S. wants your money.
Your Canadian passport is proof of your Canadian citizenship. You are denying that you are a U.S. citizen. Simply tell the border guard that you have relinquished your U.S. citizenship.
Look, I understand that practicalities and that this could be unpleasant. But, a Canadian citizen can enter the U.S. without a Visa. That gives the border guard a reason to admit you and that is what is important.
For the border guard to do anything else is to assume that once born in the U.S. you are always a U.S. citizen. The existence of 349 of the INA is proof that this is not true..
I suspect that, at a bear minimum, any border guard would know that is is possible to lose U.S. citizenship …
Finally, sure get the CLN if you want. Problem is that then you will get them thinking about what you did … So personally, if I were sure I had relinquished, the last place I would go is to the U.S. consulate.
Also, this is going to blow over. Try to relax, there is going to have to be some directive handed down to the border guards on how to deal with this. I suspect the directive will be:
If Canadian passport let them in. I would add that the failure to admit Canadians traveling on a Canadian passport would be something that will create friction with the government of Canada.
But, at the end of the day, they will admit you. They want you money.
I was reading a story about a 4 year old girl in the US who went through security and then decided to hug her grandmother. Well that did it. The security people started to frisk her and she started screaming because she’d just learned about stranger danger.
The more they touched her the more she screamed. They started referring to the 4 year old as an “uncooperative suspect”. They wouldn’t just let her go through the security screening machine again, saying she needed a complete pat down. She ran all over the airport screaming.
@renouncecitizenship
Thanks for putting things so concisely. Your explanation agrees with what I have come to believe regarding the nationality law of the U.S. This is also what the Department of State follows and thus they will backdate the Certificate of Loss of Nationality to the date of the expatriating act.
@Outraged @ Dianne
As I said above, I am taking a ‘wait and see’ approach. At this time, I really don’t wish to show up at a Consulate office as I know the IRS has no way of ‘finding’ me. However, knowing and understanding the 1986 Amendment to the Immigration and Nationality Law has given me the comfort to believe that come what may regarding FATCA and my Canadian financial institution, I can prove to them that I am only a Canadian – NOT A U.S. PERSON.
@renouncecitizenship
Your post of 10:43 A.M. – again, such good advice. The problem, as I see it is, as yet, border guards have only been told ‘if born in the u.s., then they are u.s.’. They may question you, they may even hassle you, but they still will let you into the country. One friend who crossed at Vancouver airport recently, was told by the border guard “look, lady, you are an American until we tell you otherwise”. This after she explained that she had relinquished U.S. citizenship in 1980. However, bottom line is she did get through and caught her plane
I will be crossing at a land crossing toward the end of this month. I plan on having with me the copy of my Canadian citizenship record. In that record, there is a ‘renuciatory oath’, signed by me. Of course, I am hoping that all goes smoothly and I am not questioned. But another part of me hopes they do question me. I would like to ‘educate’ the border guard by showing him that renunciatory oath.
@renounce,
Thanks so much for your reasoning on this. It gives me some comfort in ever again crossing the US border with my son (developmentally delayed and for whom I am denied the right to renounce on his behalf). He has never been registered with the US and I will never go through with registration, social security, etc., etc., for him.
In hindsight, how I wish I had been better schooled about all these implications when I entered back into the US system by going to a cross-border accounting firm for my advice instead of to an immigration/nationality lawyer and making one damning move after another — filing back US tax returns, obtaining a US passport when I was told that the next time I entered the US it was to be with a US passport, and then, fatally, voting in a US election now that ‘I was again a US citizen whether I thought otherwise previously or not’. Why were you not in my life earlier, renounce?
Onward.
@all- back in the late 70’s when I was attending college I remember talking with a fellow student who was a citizen of both Canada and the U.S. She had aquired dual citizenship because when she was born her Canadian father was a pastor in a U.S. church. She told me that eventually U.S. law required her to choose which country she would claim as her citizenship.
I remember her telling me that when the time came that she would opt to claim her Canadian citizenship as her sole citizenship.
@Petros
Is it possible to make links on the homepage to some of the more recent “external articles” like the one from Atossa and perhaps one or two of the other recent good ones on renunciation?
I think the most recent external article with a link is “WSJ: Washington’s Assault on American Expats.”
I think the article by McGurn is worth making a link to as well. The canary in the coal mine analogy is spot on.