110 thoughts on “Almost no U.S. citizenship renunciation appointments left during 2016 in Dublin; other U.S. embassies also putting up various roadblocks”

1. From what I’ve read it’s required for former U.S. Citizens to use a US passport to enter the U.S. if they haven’t yet received their CLN. After your renunciation they will take the U.S. passport but if you intend to travel to the U.S. they will give it back and only cancel it when they issue the CLN. If you relinquish instead of renounce then use of a U.S. passport would invalidate ur relinquishment and use of a non-us passport without a CLN but a U.S. birthplace could conceivably give you a headache at the border.

2. https://web.archive.org/web/20151014091310/http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/120546.pdf

   “7 FAM 1227 PREPARE CERTIFICATE OF LOSS OF NATIONALITY FOR RELINQUISHMENT CASES
   […]
   e. Status of the U.S. passport pending approval of the CLN:
   […]
   (4) If the intended expatriate advises the post that he or she needs the U.S. passport immediately because of intended travel to the United States, the consular officer should return the passport to the individual for such travel only until the loss of nationality case is approved.”

   So it’s not just for renunciation.

3. @Norman Diamond
   Thank you for pointing that out.
   And yet this is a fundamental inconsistency (forcing someone to perform an act that would theoretically confirm their intent to retain citizenship AFTER they have performed a relinquishing act).
   What if I find that I need to travel to the US AFTER I have performed a relinquishing act but BEFORE I am able to get an appointment to document said relinquishment (a not-unlikely scenario, especially in view of the ridiculous wait times)? In such a situation, frankly I would take my chances and simply travel on my non-US passport. I will not jeopardize my loss of US citizenship.
   Well, best course of action will certainly be to not visit the place while waiting for my appointment and my manumission/freedom paper (CLN)
   I’ll ask family members to refrain from dying or becoming gravely ill during that period.

4. “And yet this is a fundamental inconsistency (forcing someone to perform an act that would theoretically confirm their intent to retain citizenship AFTER they have performed a relinquishing act).”

   It almost is. If the intended expatriate uses their uncancelled US passport for any purpose other than entering the US, then it will confirm their intent to retain US citizenship.

   Though in that case, I wonder if it affects retroactive determination of what the person’s intention had been at the time of voluntarily performing the potentially expatriating act with intention to relinquish. “I relinquished but changed my mind, and now I’m just declaring the facts that I relinquished but changed my mind.” Now my mind has a headache.

5. Finished up through “M”. Two more thoughts:

   1. Posts which tell you to email/phone & refuse online bookings under “notarial or other services” are probably silently restricting the supply of appointments as well

   2. If a post doesn’t mention renunciation at all, that implies they do not forbid you to book online under “notarial or other services”, i.e. it may be a lot faster to get a first appointment there. Though as Yitzi’s post mentioned, if you go somewhere the staff aren’t familiar with procedures, it could end up going a lot slower cuz you have to handhold them through the whole thing.

6. @Blaze: They keep losing their own game so they keep changing the rules.

   Exactly. One of the games State used to play from the 1990s up until recently was “shame the renunciants as much as possible”. Make you sit up in front of a room of “loyal Americans abroad” at the consulate and tell the officer about how you want to renounce while they all sneer at your back. Print your name in the Federal Register so it’s in the public record forever.

   Then State realised this was backfiring on them, probably around the time that they did that mass renunciation in Toronto — the process no longer served to shame the renunciants, instead it was normalising them in the eyes of the rest of the diaspora and even some Homelanders. It’s easy for the US government & their enablers to keep telling the rest of the diaspora that “US taxes are a breeze to file and you won’t owe anything” and “all renunciants are rich Benedict Arnolds fleeing to tax havens” if most members of the diaspora have never seen a renunciant. It’s a lot harder when a roomful of parents trying to get CRBAs for their kids see a steady stream of ordinary kids & grandmas who decided they’d much rather be single citizens of the country where they lived than dual citizens of the US.

   The time restriction on appointments is a double-win for State. Not only does it make the process more difficult so that fewer people complete it and show up in the Federal Register & NICS, it also keeps the renunciants “quarantined” from other American Citizens Services users. Since all the renunciants show up at the consulate in the same few time slots, they mostly mix with each other in the waiting area, and fewer “loyal Americans abroad” will ever see them and get infected by their seditious ideas.

7. @Norman Diamond & Hard Pressed: Here’s the new link for that FAM section
   https://fam.state.gov/FAM/07FAM/07FAM1220.html

   At least they didn’t renumber it. Some other sections got renumbered/reorganised (e.g. the references in 9 FAM to the Reed Amendment) and now you have to look up the conversion table if you want to find them, and they took a long time to put some of the new sections online
   https://fam.state.gov/FAM/(U)9FAMTo9FAM-eCrosswalk.xlsx

8. I can’t speak for other embassies, but I can tell you that in Bern, Switzerland it can all be done in a matter of weeks. I got an appointment within 2-3 weeks of my first call, and it was all done in one go.
   I was also told by them that they are doing several renunciations a day, every day (but almost no relinquishments!)
   In Bern in any case, they are working hard at getting renunciations done. Given how much they earn doing them, I guess that shouldn’t be surprising….

9. @AJ: Good to hear there’s at least one location where things run normally. I’m just getting up to countries starting with “S” now. Bern seems to be one of the very few embassies which have a decent scheduling policy and advertise that fact on their website.

   Given how much they earn doing them, I guess that shouldn’t be surprising

   Yeah, that’s the strange thing. According to State, one individual consulate was doing an average of 110 renunciations each month in 2014 (80 FR 51465). That’s an average of nearly $13k of fee revenue each working day there. If State really wanted to, that kind of money would pay for some extra staff to help with the reading-out-loud-from-the-forms and the rubber-stamping. (Especially since they also claimed elsewhere that 90%+ of loss-of-nationality cases were renunciations, which require no sophisticated investigation of old evidence and old intentions.)

   So my conclusion is that in most places around the world, they want to keep things throttled down as slow as possible.

10. The USG wrongly thought shaming people on the Federal Register would deter people, instead it’s become a new fashion accessory for ex-pats.

    I renounced and proud of my bold step.

11. So, true — but only crystal clear to the likes of us…

    The time restriction on appointments is a double-win for State. Not only does it make the process more difficult so that fewer people complete it and show up in the Federal Register & NICS, it also keeps the renunciants “quarantined” from other American Citizens Services users. Since all the renunciants show up at the consulate in the same few time slots, they mostly mix with each other in the waiting area, and fewer “loyal Americans abroad” will ever see them and get infected by their seditious ideas.

12. I still am not clear on how this new 7 FAM 1220 – DEVELOPING A LOSS-OF-NATIONALITY CASE (which I assume knocks out / supersedes the previous FAM instructions that Norman Diamond provided) …

    (3)  Was the act performed “voluntarily,” i.e., as a product of the individual’s free will (free of the undue influence of another) with an understanding of the nature of the act and a good general knowledge of its consequences?  While difficult choices generally do not rise to the level of duress, in situations of genuine economic or other duress where there is no alternative course of action, voluntariness might be negated.

    NOTE:  Economic duress involves the genuine inability of an individual to make a living for him/herself and/or for his/her family, or subsist in a foreign country, by any means, due to U.S. nationality.  It does not mean the inability to secure foreign government employment, or indebtedness due to mortgage or loan obligations or difficulty opening or maintaining a bank account.  An individual who alleges economic duress as the basis for the commission of the expatriating act must also show that his/her personal circumstances abroad made it unreasonable for him/her to return to the Unites States to provide support for him/herself or for his/her family.

    jives with what the previous advice I got from a Washington, DC immigration / nationality lawyer:

    Department of State (DOS) persons have “sympathy” for such cases. However, the developmentally disabled person will have to have FULL understanding of what he’s doing; if any question of lack of comprehension and grasping meaning and importance of ramifications, they could NOT approve such a case. From DOS point of view, U.S. citizenship is precious and they have therefore established fundamental requirements for “compelling reason”. Even though there is the risk that a person’s financial resources could run out before his/her life was over, they will never approve a renunciation for financial / economic reasons. DOS has NEVER had such a renunciation case approved due to “compelling circumstances”. (I could sue but persons he talked with at DOS are SURE no one would ever win such a case as the courts view the discretionary action that DOS has would take precedence).

    Not clear enough for me to help enter my Canadian-born to two US parents son SAID TO BE A US CITIZEN FROM HIS FIRST BREATH (or for any other family like mine to enter their tainted family member) into the whole US process! Still looks like he and others without *requisite mental capacity* are ENTRAPPED by the great USA.

13. @Eric @Don

    This is why the “name and shame list” should be renamed the “Liberty List”. If Blaze’s brilliant observation is correct, they should be eliminating the registry soon – of course for reasons unrelated to why it was first created.

    It’s currently starting to look like a list of runaway slaves would, post-slavery.

14. @Bubblebustin

    I have to admit that I would feel a little cheated if they do away with the Liberty List before I have a chance to be proudly enrolled on it.
    If I do manage to make it on the list in time, I WILL have it framed and display it in a prominent place.

15. George, Norman, All,

    Here is an archive file of the former (now superseded) — Archived Former 7 FAM 1220 – DEVELOPING A LOSS-OF-NATIONALITY CASE

16. @ Hard Pressed,
    Re:

    “It looks like they took this entire FAM series down.”

    They moved these manuals without a redirection notice or link at the original address (don’t want to make them easy to find?).

    They were at the prefix “http://www.state.gov/documents/organization …”

    Now they’re at the prefix “https://fam.state.gov/fam …”

    We have links to them (there’s 9 or 10 FAMs in the relinquishment/renunciation series) in the Sidebar under “Important Info/Dept of State Forms, Manuals, Contact Info.”

17. @George
    The American public doesn’t know what is going on. There was someone responding to one of the compliance condor’s Facebook ads who wanted to know why his bank was turning his details over to a country he hadn’t lived or worked in for decades, so I wrote a brief factual explanation. One of my homeland friends, who I think might even be a Trump supporter, replied “That’s horrible. Is that why people are renouncing!”

18. @Hard Pressed….”Liberty List.’

    I think of the bold and courageous men that proudly penned their names to the Decleration of Independence some saying they wrote clearly and largely so the King could read their very names!!!

19. @Hard Pressed, I relinquished a decade ago, it was a unique relinquishment. I do NOT have a CLN but the USG (not State) confirmed in writing that in fact I had relinquished. To be honest I did not know about CLNs at the time and my lawyer was not of that specialty.

    I voluntarily submitted my then US Passport for cancellation and it was cancelled.

    I travel solely on a EU Passport and have traveled with no difficulties to the USA. But to be honest the first time I was very worried but once you get stamped a few times the evidence grows and grows you are not a USC. Note, by practice I enter the USA overseas through preclearence overseas so I am still a slight chicken shit. Back of the mind says if I was denied its easy to go home.

    I am slightly troubled that for Canada I will need there version of an ESTA and they ask place of birth and are you a USC. I will be applying for one soon and curious how it will work. A USA ESTA is not a problem.

20. @Mατθαίος….you bring up a good point.

    It may be prudent for a relinquisher to make an appointment before they need to travel to the USA and carry a copy of that appointment with their Canadian//Irish/EU…..passport.

21. Their BS is breathtaking.

    Joe Shmuck lives and works in Elbonia. He has no desire to live or work anywhere else For various reasons, he cannot continue to live and work in Elbonia and remain a US citizen. State calls this ‘economic duress’ which negates the required voluntary nature of renouncing so he can’t renounce and thereby can’t live in Elbonia his chosen home. Unbelievable!

22. The “economic duress” catch-22 seems to have been used in the past to deny citizenship.

    https://law.resource.org/pub/us/case/reporter/F2/233/233.F2d.551.11651.html

    Stipa was born in Plymouth, Pennsylvania, September 14, 1918 of parents who were Italian nationals and thus he acquired dual nationality in the United States and Italy under the laws of the two countries. When he was two years old, in September, 1920, his mother having died, he was taken by his father to Italy where he remained until January, 1953, when he came to this country. In November, 1945, when he was discharged from the Italian Navy (Note 7) he wrote to his brother in the United States and was advised by him that ‘he would eventually send (Stipa) the money to come to America.’ At the time of his release from the Navy Stipa ‘was in a very poor financial circumstance’.9 He testified: ‘The first job I got was to clean windows of business places, stores’.10 He sought to obtain a job ‘but there was no work’.11 He ‘was in need of assistance because after the war there was nothing to do in Italy’; he ‘could find no work in any factory or any employment whatsoever’; ‘having noticed that there were circulars around the country requesting men * * * to be employed as auxiliary police in Italy (he) proceeded to put in an application to enter this auxiliary police’ and ‘was accepted * * * sometime in October, 1947.’12

    7
    His sole reason for accepting the position in the auxiliary police was ‘for the purpose of earning a livelihood’.13 He served for two years and then resigned because he would have been required to go to a military school for further training.14

    8
    The record discloses that on August 25, 1947, some two months prior to joining the Italian police force, Stipa filed an ‘Application for (American) Passport’ on a ‘Form for Native Citizen’ with the American Consul for the district of Rome, Italy. As part of his Application, and attached to it, Stipa took an ‘Oath of Allegiance’ to the United States.15

    9
    On the facts as stated Stipa contended below, as he does here, that his employment in the auxiliary police force of Italy was compelled by ‘economic duress’ and was thus involuntary and not within the strictures of Section 401(d).

    10
    The District Court did not find that Stipa was not subjected to ‘economic duress’ but ruled against him on its view that only ‘legal duress’ could avoid the effect of expatriating conduct and that ‘economic duress’ did not constitute ‘legal duress’.

    It’s completely contradictory.

    If due to economic duress you perform a potentially relinquishing act such as working for a foreign government, economic duress doesn’t make your relinquishing act involuntary, so they rule that you’ve relinquished your citizenship and can’t regain it.

    But if you want to lose your citizenship, and they decide that you’re doing it due to economic duress caused by your US citizenship, economic duress does make your relinquishing act (or your renunciation) involuntary, so you can’t expatriate.

    It makes no sense.

23. Just an opinion. The US Embassy in Switzerland recognizes that the US government has lost the hearts and minds of long-term American residents there. It sees statistics such as: a. a decline in number of Americans living in the country due to departure and naturalization; b. a reduction in babies born to US citizen mothers being registered with the Swiss government as Americans; and c. a (strongly suspected) decline in the number of births abroad registered at the Embassy. It hears regular complaints of banking and job discrimination against American citizens in the country. It knows that many Americans in Switzerland despise it and the US government for what it has done to them.

    In November 1989 East Germany opened the wall in an attempt to not completely lose control over its population. The Bern Embassy, by offering quick renunciation appointments, is doing something similar.

    Also, thank you Eric for your write-up and analysis.

24. @ Innocente
    It also seems to me that unlike other countries, many everyday Swiss citizens that I speak with are fully aware of the plight of Americans residing in Switzerland and are sympathetic to the harm that the American Gov has done to them.

25. Comment after comment (including my own) repeats that there is nothing in this situation that makes any sense. I just realized that if you look at it from the perspective of the US government, it does make sense in a perverse sort of way.

    The guiding principal is actually very simple: whatever it is that an expat wants, they will deny it. This is in accordance with the overriding, all important basic principal that expats need to be punished because they are expats.