Renunciation and Relinquishment of United States Citizenship: Discussion thread (Ask your questions) Part Two
Ask your questions about Renunciation and Relinquishment of United States Citizenship and Certificates of Loss of Nationality.
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NB: This discussion is a continuation of an older discussion that became too large for our software to handle well. See Renunciation and Relinquishment of United States Citizenship: Discussion thread (Ask your questions) Part One
Jim. I tried to answer your same question on the expat taxes thread. I guess the answer wasn’t enough.
Thanks Duke of Devon. No disrespect, but the article you were referring to doesn’t apply to me.
I’m just trying to see if I can get any other answers. Your help is greatly appreciated.
Can anything be done about almost 5000 replies to this thread? It gets tedious when you have to click a thousand times to get to the latest post.
@ Polly
If I access this thread from Recent Comments I go to the URL bar, DELETE everything past “renunciation/”, PRESS ENTER and voila there’s the last page of comments instead of many pages prior. I think that’s about 3 clicks.
Polly, always access this thread and a few others from the ‘Ask your questions about’ link on the right or the ‘take action’ links. They work properly. I can’t get MBs shortcut to work on an Ipad
@ Polly
Duke’s right … any thread that doesn’t have a number – comments link can be found in the sidebar where there is direct access to the latest page. We don’t have cell phones and tablets and such so I forget there are different techniques used on these devices.
Does anyone know if being employed with the health authority for my province or serving on jury duty in my province count as expatriating acts? Background info: I was born in the US to Canadian parents who were there for school and moved to Canada at 3months old. Have not since lived in the US, never had a US passport, officially obtained Canadian citizenship at 9 years old (although my parents say they applied well before that). I recently became aware in 2014 of all the FATCA stuff and was scared into officially filing taxes this year for the past 5 years. I have been employed with the health authority in my province as a nurse since 2008, but have switched locations several times. I served on jury duty for 10 weeks last year on a trial at the The Court of Queen’s Bench for my province. I’m just trying to figure out what my options for relinquishment/renunciation are at this point in time. Thanks.
@ Emty,
Someone else can probably provide more specific information for you, possibly from their own experience, but I do recall that Prairie Girl wrote that her relinquishing act was employment as an administrative secretary in a hospital. Her report, and that of several others who relinquished by government employment, are at this link: Reports by persons who relinquished US citizenship upon taking government employment.
This post and its comments may also be of use to you: Relinquishment of US Citizenship by Persons-Born-Dual or who Naturalised in a Foreign Country as a Minor
These and other posts that may be of interest can also be accessed at “How to renounce/relinquish” under “Important Info” in the sidebar.
@ Emty,
One other thing, the tax filing is not necessarily fatal to a relinquishment. There’s been about 5 pre-2004 relinquishers we know of who filed out of confusion when first hearing about this and it was not held against them.
In fact, since your relinquishing act would have occurred in 2008, it would fall under the current exit tax law. That is, since 2004, no matter when the citizenship actually ended, IRS considers it to have ended on the date the person notifies Dept of State of the relinquishing act (26 US Code s. 877A(g)(4)(B). So, on q. 13(e) of the DS-4079, you can say you filed to wrap things up for expatriation (not to reclaim or exercise citizenship).
Department of State (and everybody else) considers the citizenship to end the date of the relinquishing act (provided of course DoS agrees that a relinquishment did occur).
26 US Code s. 877A(g)(4) – Tax Responsibilities of Expatriation
For Emty’s benefit, perhaps someone that definitely knows can comment.
I thought that Canada recently changed (retroactively) citizenship law for those born abroad. When I was born in the US in the 60s to Canadian parents, parents had up to 2 years to register you with the Canadian gov’t, giving you Canadian citizenship from birth. I believe that law was changed in the last few years, so that those that weren’t registered but returned to Canada would be considered Canadian from birth. (FATCA-related perhaps?)
If this is the case, this should allow Emty to avoid covered expat status should Emty feel the need to file the exit tax form, as demanded by the US.
@pacifica777 Thanks for the information, I’ll check out the links that you provided. If my employment does prove to be able to grant me relinquishment is there a way in which I will need to prove that I took it with the intent to relinquish my US citizenship? While I was somewhat peripherally aware of my dual citizenship at that them, I was not wholly invested in the renunciation/relinquishment aspects until learning of the more invasive nature of my “US citizenship” more recently.
Emty. Too bad you were frightened into filing 5 years. But look on the bright side. Now, after you relinquish or renounce, you will be all caught up and will have no trouble at all with the exit formalities. Whether or not to bother depends on your US ties, your risk tolerance, and your future plans. In your case, you are 5/6 of the way there so might as well finish the job.
Jury duty almost certainly won’t qulalify as a relinquishing act. Working for a Canadian province may or may not. It’s supposed to be a policy level job but as you go through the reports, at least one Brocker was successful working for a municipal government. I suspect the consul would turn you down. Then you could insist they send it to Washington in any case. BC Doc was turned down. She then said (to hersel) f*** you ‘I know I relinquished’. ‘So I’m not doing anything more.’
I think it’s going to cost you $2350 US to be free. We are here to help once you’ve had time to consider your next steps. I’m curious how you were frightened into filing. There are a number of unscrupulous accountants out there.
@Emty,
Now that you have had to think about it, you’ve remembered clearly that without a doubt you knew working for the government was a potentially expatriating act, and you took the employment with the intention of relinquishing your US citizenship, right?
As a born dual-citizen, 2 of the 3 exit tax tests don’t apply to you. You only have to certify tax filing obligations have been met, which you have done.
@Portland made a wrong statement. Government employment does NOT have to be a policy-level position. There is absolutely no question about this. This is clearly indicated in the FAM and other US government web pages.
Provincial and municipal employment counts just as well as federal. Don’t let anybody tell you different (including a US consul!). I would agree that jury duty likely doesn’t count. Note also that working under contract as opposed to being an employee has been denied by Washington DC.
@ Emty,
Very often, in all areas of law, it’s not possible to prove intent (what was in someone’s mind), so it has to be inferred. With relinquishment, it’s inferred through the person’s behaviour following their relinquishing act.
If someone’s planning to relinquish now, say next week or next month, one can write a statement at this time, get it notarised – the notarisation doesn’t make it any more true, but it locks in the date you had the intention – to the effect of “I will be taking government employment (or whatever relinquishing act) on (date) with the intention of simultaneously relinquishing my US citizenship.” This is not required, so some do, some don’t.
However, for many years many people had reason to believe they had terminated their citizenship and acted as non-USCs as a result, but were never told to apply for a CLN, or even heard of one. So, the DS-4079 questionnaire is very important for past relinquishments. Since DoS can’t know what was in our mind at the time years ago, they infer the intention from what we’ve done (and not done) afterwards.
However, you may very likely be asked, “How did you know that taking that job could cause you to terminate your citizenship?” You might not have been aware of the Immigration and Nationality Act, but perhaps you believed this due to word of mouth. Perhaps you knew someone who had ended their US citizenship in that way. Or for that matter, you may have looked it up in the Immigration and Nationality Act, for all I (or anyone) know.
Re: “It’s supposed to be a policy level job”
No, non-policy level jobs are fine.
The administrative presumption is that a person performing any relinquishing act is presumed to have intended to retain their US citizenship. There are a couple of exceptions, which reverse the presumption. One of these exceptions is policy level government employment. In that case the person is presumed to have intended to relinquish.
Non-policy level government employment has the same onus as the very common relinquishment by naturalisation. You’re presumed to have intended to keep your US citizenship. But it’s a rebuttable presumption.
@Emty
The Mom is right – Canada’s Citizenship Act was amended in 2009, likely making you a Canadian citizen at birth,
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/citizenship/rules_2009.asp
which, as WhatAmI mentioned, would under specific circumstances exempt you from the US exit tax (if applicable) as you are able to certify at least five years of tax compliance.
Thanks everyone, this is a lot of information to consider. I was scared into filing taxes by my parents who had heard about FATCA through the news. They tend to get a little excitable and because of inheritance issues and such they strongly recommended that I sort things out as I saw fit. I believe the accountant I used was above board, but of course suggested filing was the best way to get everything “sorted out.”
So I may have something to look into pursuing the health authority employment. Is it best to get in contact with an immigration lawyer or should I just book an appointment at the closest US embassy?
I stand corrected. However a consul might try to turn you down based on several different arguments. 1) he might say you didn’t accept a position with a foreign government. 2) she might argue you lacked the requisite intent. Intent is supposed to be inferred by subsequent actions. I.e. You didn’t get a US passport, you didn’t vote, and so on. You would need to argue you were coerced into filing taxes.
You can go ahead and request an appointment. The waiting list is long. There are some lawyers who know this subject well and some who don’t. It’s up to you to decide if it’s worth the time and cost to consult a lawyer.
@Portland
I occurs to me that since anybody who relinquishes after June 2004 is still on the hook for filing taxes, Emty’s recent tax filing shouldn’t be a problem. She took the provincial employment in 2008 intending to relinquish, but only found out last year that tax filing was required. No problem at all as long as there were no other actions as a USC.
I think the consuls have learned a lot in the past few years. It’s been quite a while since I last heard of a consul insisting on an oath with government employment for a person who already has the foreign citizenship, or that a policy-level position is required. I anticipated these issues for my own appointment over a year ago and had printouts of gov’t websites and the FAM. I didn’t have to bring them out though.
As somebody mentioned, she needs an answer to the question “how did you know at the time that gov’t employment was an expatriating act?”
@ WhatAmI,
That’s what I’m seeing too. She believed she relinquished her citizenship in 2008 and was no longer a USC, but it was just in this past year or so that she found out about CLNs and that IRS considers you a “tax citizen” until the date you apply for the CLN, so she filed. Even with pre-2004 relinquishers, who got confused/panicked about tax filing, it hasn’t presented a problem (not in the cases I’m aware of, anyway) as they made it clear they filed out of confusion/uncertainty not as an attempt to regain citizenship. So, given the current law, it shouldn’t be an issue with a post-2004 person if they make it clear they did it solely to wrap things up with IRS. (It seems to me that a lot of people back-file after their consulate meeting, but some do prefer to do their back-filing first.)
Agree also that the “How did you know at the time that gov’t employment was an expatriating act?” question is important. These consulate meetings are usually quite short, not much in the way of questions. But, based on reports from s. 4 relinquishers, that question is very likely to be asked and it’s crucial to the existence of intent. It’s also q. 19 of the DS-4079.
Also agree with your middle paragraph. I suspect the Brockers have been doing a great job educating them 🙂
@bubblebustin, thanks.
@Emty, DO NOT freely offer the info to the consulate or State Dept. regarding the change in Canadian citizenship law that would now make you retroactively born a Canadian citizen. They would likely attempt to use that to keep you from relinquishing, they did it to me. (I had been born dual, with no government employment.) If you received Canadian citizenship when you were 9, stick with that for citizenship purposes if they’ll let you relinquish based on government employment.
You’d want to stick with born dual for the exit tax form, though, if you file it.
@The Mom,
I don’t follow your comment (and I don’t remember your history) so I assume @Emty won’t either.
@Emty’ parents were both Canadian, so she was a Canadian since birth. I suspect all she did at the age of 9 was to get the equivalent of a Registration of Birth Abroad (as a Canadian citizen). I got mine when I was 12 years old. The 2009 law change made no changes to her citizenship, and there is no problem with a born dual-citizen (or a naturalizer as a minor) in claiming government employment as an expatriating act.
If I’m wrong and she actually (but unnecessarily) naturalized at age 9, the US won’t care about that. I’m quite sure from other Brocker’s reports that the US will also consider her a Canadian since birth. I think they have even rejected the application for a RoBA as an expatriating act because in their eyes the act of applying for the certificate does not change citizenship status since it was there since borth. But really, it doesn’t matter for relinquishment. I see nothing here that jeopardizes her relinquishment due to government employment.
@WhatAmI
Why is it I had to get landed immigrant status when I moved to Canada in 1968 with my Canadian born mother? In 1996 I applied for and obtained Canadian citizenship. 2009 amendments to the Citizenship Act now entitle me to Canadian citizenship at birth, like my brother just applied for and received documentation of. Prior to 2009, I thought that in order to document a Canadian birth abroad, it must be have been done before the child is two.
@Bubblebustin
Prior to 2009, a person born outside of Canada had to have a Canadian father (or both) to be a Canadian born abroad. A Canadian mother wasn’t enough! The 2009 changes made it so that a Canadian mother was good enough as well. The change was retroactive.
The 2-year deadline to register a birth abroad seems to have been relaxed at some point. I got mine when we moved to Canada in the mid-60’s when I was 12. I’m guessing that @Emty got hers at age 9.
I’m not sure exactly what my parents did. I know I have a Canadian Citizenship card dated 1991 and my mother says she doesn’t know why it took that long because they applied for it long before that (I don’t know when exactly).
I’m not sure how to proceed as I’m not 100% sure my employment qualifies as government employment or not though. I work in a hospital and am employed by the health authority in my province that was founded by the provincial government. I don’t know whether to bother trying to see if it would pan out or just renounce and get it all over and done with.