The folks over at the Federal Register have put the “Internal” Revenue Service’s Q3 2016 Quarterly Publication of Individuals Who Have Chosen to Expatriate up for public inspection. I count 1,379 names of newly-minted ex-U.S. citizens in this list, making it the second-largest list ever published (beaten only by the Q3 2015 list, which had 1,426 names).
The list is scheduled for official publication on 10 November, eleven days later than the 30-day deadline specified by 26 USC § 6039G(d). Obama’s Treasury Secretaries have only managed to meet the list’s deadline eight times out of 31 during his term as president (three so far for Jack Lew, and five for Tim Geithner, assuming we count the late Q4 2012 list as being his fault). However, Bush’s appointees didn’t have a much better track record: Hank Paulson only published one list on time during eleven quarters, while John Snow holds the all-time delay record of 516 days for the Q3 2005 list.
Who are the people in this list?
The latest list was published just after the news broke that Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential election, but contrary to media hype, there’s very little connection between that news and people who choose to give up U.S. citizenship. After every U.S. election you can find all sorts of hysterical Internet surfers claiming they want to renounce their citizenship and flee the new regime, but for the most part these aren’t the people who actually move abroad, let alone go to a U.S. consulate and pay $2,350 for State Department bureaucrats to push renunciation papers around.
First and foremost, all of the people in the Federal Register list already live in other countries, and have been living there since long before the election. This latest list includes people who are known from media reports to have given up U.S. citizenship as recently as July, though most probably made their final visit to the U.S. consulate late last year or early this year.
Some were self-identifying Americans abroad who saw cutting off their legal ties to Washington, DC (and its coterie of self-serving revolving-door bureaucrats who pretend they don’t know that they’re ruining our lives) as the only way to survive all the damage that previous presidents and Congresses inflicted on the diaspora. They’d reached their breaking points long before anyone knew who’d even be on the ballot in November, let alone how long it would take the next administration to follow through on its promises to make things right.
Others considered themselves primarily as citizens of other countries, and saw U.S. citizenship as a barrier to their lives in the country they considered home. They didn’t have any stake in who’d be U.S. president — but instead of making it easy for these de facto non-Americans to become de jure non-Americans, the U.S. government put all sorts of unnecessary barriers in their way, turning what should have been an amicable split into a bureaucratic nightmare.
Why isn’t my name in there?
In addition to being late, the Federal Register list is widely recognised as being incomplete too. Aside from the IRS, the FBI also maintains a list of renunciants in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System gun control database (NICS), in order to enforce provisions of federal law (18 USC 922(g)(7)) barring renunciants from purchasing firearms. They don’t make the names public, but each month they publish a report on the size of the database; according to those reports, the FBI added 4,240 renunciant records from the beginning of this year until 30 September (growing from 32,666 to 36,906).
In contrast, the Federal Register only gave us 3,046 renunciants and relinquishers over the same period (509 last quarter, and 1,158 in Q1). And that’s not even mentioning the tens of thousands of people who abandon green cards each year, whom the Federal Register list misleadingly implies are included as well (“[f]or purposes of this listing, long-term residents, as defined in section 877(e)(2), are treated as if they were citizens of the United States who lost citizenship”).
As always, after the jump please find an updated table of people who are known from media reports to have given up U.S. citizenship recently, including whether or not their names have appeared in the Federal Register.
Media reports
| Name | Occupation | Other citizenship |
Giving up US citizenship | Appeared in Federal Register? |
Source | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reason | Date | |||||
| LU Shu-hao | Military | Taiwan | Service in Republic of China Army | January 2014 or earlier | No | Taipei Times |
| Sandy OPRAVIL | Housewife | Switzerland | Save her mortgage | February 2014 | Q3 2014 | Newsweek |
| Roger VER | Bitcoin investor | St. Kitts & Nevis | Libertarian political opinions | February 2014 | No | Bloomberg |
| Sophia MARTELLY | Politician | Haiti | Run for Senate of Haiti | March 2014 | Q3 2015 | Haiti Press Network |
| Ya’aqov BEN-YEHUDAH | Writer | Israel | Complicated; see source | March 2014 | Q2 2014 | Times of Israel |
| Sean CAVANAUGH | Technology | Canada | FATCA | April 2014 | Q1 2015 | Tweeted own CLN in August 2014 |
| Mona QUARTEY | Politician | Ghana | Become Deputy Finance Minister of Ghana | July 2014 | No | Graphic News (Ghana) |
| Alex KIM | Singer | South Korea | Obtain South Korean citizenship & serve in military | August 2014 | Q1 2016 | Herald Business (South Korea) |
| Nicole BEAUDOIN | Unknown | Canada | FATCA | September 2014 | Q3 2014 | La Presse (Canada) |
| KIM Sungkyum | Military | South Korea | Be commissioned an officer in the Republic of Korea Army | December 2014 | Q1 2015 | Kookbang Ilbo (South Korea) |
| LIN Jou-min | Architect | Taiwan | Take position in Taipei city government | December 2014 | Q3 2015 | Central News Agency (Taiwan) |
| Rachel AZARIA | Politician | Israel | Take office as Member of Knesset | January 2015 | Q2 2016 | Times of Israel |
| Jonathan TEPPER | Macroeconomic analyst | United Kingdom | FATCA & other U.S. tax reporting requirements | January 2015 | Q1 2016 | The New York Times |
| David ALWARD | Politician | Canada | Become Canadian consul-general in Boston | April 2015 or earlier | Q3 2015 | Canadian Broadcasting Corporation |
| Alfred Oko VANDERPUIJE | Politician | Ghana | Stand for election to Parliament | August 2015 | No | Starr FM (Ghana) |
| Philip RYU | Singer | South Korea | Serve in South Korean army | September 2015 or earlier | No | Money Today (South Korea) |
| Rachel HELLER | Writer | Netherlands | FATCA & other U.S. tax reporting requirements even when no U.S. tax is owed | November 2015 | No | Blog (will be included in TV news programme at a later date) |
| KANG Dong-suk | Violinist | South Korea | Restore South Korean citizenship | 2015 (month not specified) | No | News1 (South Korea) |
| Neil (Teodoro) LLAMANZARES | Businessman | Philippines | Public opinion (his wife ran for President, but lost after he renounced) | April 2016 | Q3 2016 | Rappler (Philippines) |
| LEE Chih-kung | Physicist | Taiwan | Appointed Minister of Economic Affairs by President-elect Tsai Ing-wen | May 2016 | Q3 2016 | Apple Daily (Taiwan) |
| Ned MANNOUN | Politician | Australia | Run for Australian parliament | May 2016 or earlier | No | Liverpool Champion (Australia) |
| Yehuda GLICK | Politician | Israel | Take office as Member of Knesset | May 2016 | No | Arutz Sheva (Israel) |
| Judy CHAN Ka-pui | Politician | Hong Kong | Run for Hong Kong Legislative Council | July 2016 | Q3 2016 | Apple Daily (Hong Kong) |
| Kimi ONODA | Politician | Japan | Dual-at-birth, did Japanese-law “choice of nationality” long ago, didn’t know U.S. still considered her a citizen | October 2016? | No | Viewpoint (Japan) |
Regarding the newest addition to the table: Japan, like Jamaica and Pakistan before it, is in the middle of a scandal about lawmakers holding dual citizenship, and so various politicians have been rushing to renounce their other citizenships. Onoda, who was born in Chicago, issued a statement in early October that she is currently undergoing procedures to give up U.S. citizenship according to U.S. law, but didn’t say whether she’d actually made her final visit to the U.S. consulate to sign the paperwork. I do not know whether she will be swearing an oath of renunciation or trying to claim relinquishment under 8 USC § 1481(a)(4).
If you know of any other recent media reports which have interviewed people giving up U.S. citizenship, for whatever reason, leave a comment and I’ll add them to the table.
@Bubbles @Barbara; “Renunciations should only increase with Trump as president”
Lets look at that statement calmly and coldly. You are both sounding like a Homelander.
Bill Clinton was an ass and “everyone was going to leave the country.”
George Bush was an ass and “everyone was going to leave the country.”
The truth was it NEVER happened.
What is TRUE is that Obama and the Democrat Congress WAS an ass and expatriation hit all time records!!
The name and shame list was originally designed to shame people but today I have adopted the thesis that the name and shame list is the growing shame of the USA!!!
We all talk to fellow expats. Yesterday, I spoke to one family that cancelled their renunciation appointment next month, actually they rescheduled to a later date next spring but they rescheduled to see what is going to happen.
It is likely that there will be a dip in actual renunciations although the list may not be right as its a lagging indicator. The dip will be the wait and see.
Now, if FATCA is not repealed with respect to outlanders then I will join the chorus DJT lied to me. I WILL consider adoption of same country exemption as betrayal because expats were given a choice between two platforms.
In 2018, DJT will own the name and shame list 100% be it increasing or be it decreasing, it is in his hands.
@George
I’m assuming that those long term expats who are considering renouncing don’t know about the GOP platform, and maybe even assume that he would make things worse under Trump. We simply don’t know what his perspective is, because he hasn’t given it. You’d think he’s aware of the expat vote and try to garner it, so perhaps his attitude toward us was better for him not to express prior to the election.
You guys are under the illusion that the con man Trump gives a shit. We don’t know his perspective because he doesn’t have one.
@DOD
Advocate all you want for others to renounce, but please show some respect for those who choose to advocate for change.
@George: For the record, I never said what you quote me above. In fact, this is my first post on this thread.
I must say, though, that I have heard a few US expats in my area shooting off their mouths about renouncing because of Trump. All of these are under-30 hotheads who (I’m guessing) probably aren’t even aware of their requirement to file US taxes.
I agree with Bubblebustin in condemning DOD’s cynicism. This sneering attitude of “Nothing will change” is, at best, premature.
In my case, I can’t renounce because I have no opportunity for a second citizenship. The Republican control of the US government gives me the first hope in years that I will be able to stop worrying about this. That’s why I’m gunning my engines to do all I can to influence the incoming administration and Congress. I think it’s a bit premature right now, but by early December I hope we’ve got a solid list of whom to contact and what to tell them.
I had been living overseas but am back in the US now. I am a tax specialist and I was overseas when FATCA was enacted. From comments and questions I received, it seems that most of those giving up citizenship fall into either one of two categories: (I) accidental Americans who were born in the US but had no real ties here or (ii) long term expats, often married to non-Americans. In the first case, their parents were temporarily working or going to school in the US when they were born (though some Canadians were born in US hospitals due complications better addressed in a nearby US hospital than a Canadian one). In most cases, they probably have never had a US passport and never considered themselves American. In the second case, I have seen lots of long-term expats. They really have US ties of family, memory and sentiment. They just have lived elsewhere. They seem to be the ones where this decision is emotionally tough.
Both have their own difficulties. In the first case, the person should have been filing US tax returns and has not. While in most cases, there will be no US taxes due, you cannot be sure of that. I have spoken with people from low tax jurisdictions (like Switzerland or the Gulf States) and even if they only go back 5 years (which is a sort of rule of thumb), the amount of tax can be great. Even people from high tax jurisdictions may find themselves owing tax because a specific transaction (such as the sale fo a home outside the US) may have no local tax but have US tax.
The whole thing is a mess.
@Room237
I agree, the US should have a real tax amnesty.
You have a pretty good idea of who the renunciants are (NOT the mythical people fleeing the US), so do you have any idea what percentage of renunciants are actually tax compliant when they renounce?
Re: “. . . (though some Canadians were born in US hospitals due complications better addressed in a nearby US hospital than a Canadian one).”
This may be the case for some Canadians. However for many others, it was simply a common practice for children (of either country) to be born at the closest hospital. It was generally a routine matter of distance, road conditions into the mid-20th century, and the fact that the border was no big deal in that era.
Week-late utter garbage article:
http://www.moneyinternational.com/tax/americans-giving-passports/
1. Tries to portray renunciants as rich people fleeing the country to living tax-free in Dubai and people who complain about FATCA as right wing Republican commentators
2. Claims green card holders are in the list
3. Calls OVDI participants “errant US taxpayers” who “confess[ed] they had secret overseas cash”
And this article claims that the people in the latest list renounced because of Trump getting elected and that London had a waiting list of only one month for renunciation appointments prior to the election.
http://metro.co.uk/2016/11/16/loads-of-americans-are-renouncing-their-citizenship-6261622/
First claim is barred by the laws of physics, and the second contradicts earlier reports that wait times have been at obscene levels for years — e.g. this August 2010 FT piece saying that there were no more appointments until February 2011, i.e. six months https://www.ft.com/content/0ae8415c-9e5e-11df-a5a4-00144feab49a
Author is on Twitter
https://twitter.com/tobymeyjes
@Eric “because Trump elected”. The hypocrisy is so thick the past week, I can barely breath. Trump is urged to “respect the constitution”. If Obama had been respecting the constituion, i.e. getting Congressional approval for FATCA treaties rather than autocratically renaming them IGAs, etc, we wouldn’t be in this FATCA mess and this website wouldn’t even be necessary.
@Eric… gave the author of the Metro story a piece of mind for the utter sh*t he calls news! Told him to do his freaking homework!
Here on the other hand, is a brand new 67 year old FATCA victim who worked so hard to get it and didn’t know what she was aiming for:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/identity-lost-post-war-japan-took-67-years-045007713.html
Who’s going to break the news to her?
@Norman Diamond
Her bank.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-flag-burning_us_583d6f88e4b0860d61164f72
Trump suggests another way.
@Ginny……. YES!!!!!
That would help solve sooo many problems.
The proposal could be restrictive in that; 1. said flag must be burned on foreign soil, 2.) Loss of US Citizenship shall solely apply as long as you have another citizenship and are not rendered stateless.
This may sound all tongue in cheek but……..a “campaign” for this might bring daylight on to our cause!!
IBS could go into the US Flag business selling highly flammable medium size flags that are eco-friendly. The flag needs to be big enough so you can be photographed in the act and its clear you are burning a US Flag and not a French Flag. We would also want a highly flammable flag so it burns clean…..eco friendly.
Wait……we could have group US Flag burnings. And provide photographers to film the dirty deed and media on hand to publish a list in the local media of who burned the flag.
As a lawyer you could set up a pre-burning stall where you would ask and verify “is it your intent to relinquish USC by burning this flag or are you burning it just cause?” Then you could attest the statement. 😉
Seriously we really need to help Congress come up with some ways to throw our USC under the bus. Sadly part of our problem today is what American Citizens Abroad did to us over the years making it easier to retain and pass on citizenship. ACA created the problem.
Priceless.
Is he kidding? There’s nothing more American than a good old US flag burning!
I wouldn’t be surprised to hear him say that anyone who’d renounce their US citizenship should have their US citizenship taken away.
@Bubbles……..but this brings up that the Courts and Congress have made citizenship disposal too difficult.
And our local legal post-tax bank accounts in our actual country of residence (ex. Canada) was deemed a problem for me to hold as a US citizen just in case I earned some paltry 1% or less of interest without telling FINCEN?
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/26/us/politics/donald-trump-international-business.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=b-lede-package-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0
@ George
Let’s go into business together; I like your flag burning ideas. I sign affidavits for free!
I really want Trump to be serious about this- damn first amendment rights, you go Trump! Make it law for those who want this. Post election promises count.
@Ginny…on a sober and serious note. Whilst I would think such a flag burning law as absurd on the one hand, I would be pleased to see it made into law. Thats a testament as to how bad things have become.
Your a lawyer though Canadian not US law. But its close enough for this discussion.
US Courts have determined that it is unconstitutional for the USG to strip the USC from a USC. OK, I suppose that I can accept that. BUT how can it be constitutional to saddle someone with USC they do not want and create hurdles that are difficult to jump over in disposing of unwanted USC.
The founding documents of the USA show that the country was founded on the principles of the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness.
Being unable to easily dispose of USC is a threat to liberty itself.
FATCA brought all this to our attention and just as FATCA came online the ability to dispose of USC became very difficult. Really the right thing would have been to add an amendment to FATCA creating a streamlined and cheap way to dispose of USC. One notarised form and a twenty dollar processing/postage fee, that should have been it.
Making it harder to be a deemed USC abroad and harder to get rid of USC seems a slap in the face of the founding documents.
I liked some of the old rules on losing USC like voting in an election or not registering beyond a certain age if you lived abroad and were “dual.” To be honest, those laws in retrospect were reasonable especially if by way of example if you voted in a foreign election with the intent to lose USC!
Again many of our problems owe their origin to the beginning of American Citizens Abroad ACA that “fought” for our rights.
Protecting you from losing USC to the extreme is as bad as preventing you from disposing of USC.
I wonder what a poll of dual nationals abroad would show if the question was; If you could relinquish your USC by posting a one page notarized form and twenty dollars knowing this would end your USC and also end any past/future filing obligations would you do it?
I would guess that the USA would get a million plus forms in the post.
…and the thinking of US Department of State…
From my previous comments here:
The definition of *US exceptionality* for my family came from the Washington, DC US immigration / nationality lawyer I hired — the answer he got regarding my case from Department of State officials:
I’d add American Citizens Abroad as well.
In the words of professor Christians, rather than making it more difficult to leave, they should be making it easier to stay.
Sounds like a great demonstration to hold before the U.S. Embassy in Ottawa. A long line of renunciates signing their affidavits, burning their flags and follow-up smiling photo of victory!!!! What could be better for both governments to see?
@George
I’m going to get creative here and think outside the box here. Clinging US nationality wasn’t a problem for many of us here in Canada until the former Conservative government signed on to the FATCA IGA and formally recognized the the US citizenship of Canadian citizens living in Canada turning us into second class Canadian citizens. Some of us tried to document our loss of US citizenship but were refused by the US State Department (myself, Calgary411’s son). For many of us in Canada, FATCA is a problem because of the Canadian government’s actions.
Here’s where it might be fun to get creative.
The Canadian government has a fairly straight forward and reasonably priced way to get rid of your Canadian citizenship (not that many people wish to). One fills out a form, completes it, and sends it to Immigration Canada:
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/citizenship/renounce.asp
As a bit of a PR stunt and protest, given that the Canadian government has created this problem, and the problem exists while folks like me live as Canadians in Canada, it would be “fun” to submit the form to Immigration Canada requesting/demanding documentation of loss of US citizenship. Fill out the form, submit a cheque for $100, and send it off to good old Sydney, Nova Scotia. As Canada helped create the mess, Citizenship Canada can help us extricate ourselves from the mess in a more cost effective, reasonable manner. I have little doubt that they would refuse to process the application, but wouldn’t it be fun to screw with the bureaucracy?
Off to work here now. My thought du jour for a bit of civil disobedience here north of the 49th parallel!