Tina Turner ‘to become Swiss, give up US passport’
25 January 2013 – 10H41
US singer Tina Turner arrives for the Emporio Armani fashion show in Milan, on February 26, 2011. Turner — who has been living in Switzerland since 1995 — will soon receive Swiss citizenship and will give up her US passport, according to Swiss media reports.AFP – US pop legend Tina Turner, who has been living in Switzerland since 1995, will soon receive Swiss citizenship and will give up her US passport, Swiss media reported Friday.
“I’m very happy in Switzerland and I feel at home here. … I cannot imagine a better place to live,” Turner told German language daily Blick….
Makes sense. She’s lived in Switzerland for the past 20 years, so she might as well continue doing so under the same conditions as any other Swiss citizen. Switzerland is a great place for celebrities, since they can go about their normal lives without people making a big deal out of such.
Due to the Reed Amendment, a de facto gag order, that empowers the Attorney General to banish forever anyone who renounces US shitizenship for tax reasons, Tina Turner will most likely not be willing to openly explain her reasons for renouncing like Gerard Depardieu did.
The Guardian: Is Tina Turner the Gérard Depardieu of America?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/poll/2013/jan/25/tina-turner-gerard-depardieu-america-poll
I doubt very much that Mrs. Turner relinquished/renounced her US Citizenship for tax purposes as she would more than likely have to pay the 30% exit tax to ‘get out’.
I think it’s a simple matter of ‘piece of mind’ rather than trying to make a statement.
Most of us on this site all know the extra-territorial reach and the cost of compliancey year after after year. Not to mention the expenditure of life credit units to keep on top of the latest legislation or IRS fact sheets.
Then the sleepless nights worrying if the Dept of Treasury will accept your reasonable cause letter….
I congratulate you Miss Tina Turner!
Oh dear, what will Oprah say? She was such a big fan of Tina Turner that she went on tour with her in 1997. Will Oprah dissolve her fanship of the now non-American Tina? I say Swiss in Peace, Tina! You don’t owe anybody anything, including an explanation.
@mach73 It think it is a 15% like Capital Gain exit tax
@Marie… I won’t expect that any of the popular media will draw the connection between her renouncement and our issues with Citizenship taxation and FATCA
@Shadow Raider, it certainly is.
@ Christophe Here is a new opportunity for you to educate NPR and their audience there. Foreign Investors Trade Dollars For U.S. Residency I issued an FBAR and FATCA warning, and last I looked, still in moderation.
I wish her well in her endeavor to be Swiss.
@Em
Maybe Oprah will be next 😉 They could start a craze.
Even if no connection can be made with taxes, isn’t it enough for homelanders to realize that they aren’t the be all and end all to citizenship? How about a little overdue introspection!
@ Just Me
I “up arrowed” your comment and Julian’s too. I hope others will send NPR a message by doing the same. There is more content in those 2 comments than the article.
I think she just wants peace of mind (like many others here) and sees all the FATCA / FBAR stuff for what it is– just plain tyranny.
She’s a 73 year old ex-pat and probably tired of Uncle Sam dreaming up new ways to invade her life to pick her pockets, while receiving nothing meaningful in return other than membership in the all inclusive forms and penalties club.
The Atlantic: Why Tina Turner Won’t Be an American Citizen Anymore
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/entertainment/2013/01/why-tina-turner-wont-be-american-citizen-anymore/61426/
Congratulations Tina. You broke the shackles!
@Em…
Thanks for letting me know. I had not been back to the NPR story to check yet. Never sure that I will be moderate enough for their moderator. I usually have to do some editing, but did leave in the hyperbolic Final FATCA FATWA. I like that that characterization.
*My second attempt to post to the abcnews blog also got censured. here is what I had written:
The censorship may have to do with the nickname I was using. I was posting as “FormerAmerican”.
Some insightful coverage:
And Turner isn’t the first one to give up her citizenship. Scrapping US passports is becoming more common each year. At least 1,788 Americans gave up their US citizenship in 2011, which exceeded totals from 2007, 2008 and 2009 combined. A number of prominent and wealthy Americans have already done so, including Facebook co-founder and billionaire Eduardo Saverin.
The US requires Americans to pay taxes even while living abroad. Both US citizens and resident aliens are required to file income, estate and gift tax returns and file estimated taxes no matter where they are living. Their worldwide income is also subject to US income tax.
And a few lawmakers are trying to subject Americans to taxes even after giving up their citizenship. Sens. Charles Schumer and Bob Casey last year suggested that Congress vote for a law that would force former US citizens to pay taxes for years after renouncing their citizenship – as well as ban them from every returning to the US.
If millionaires and billionaires like Turner and Saverin kept their US citizenships even while living abroad, they would continue to pay large sums of money to the IRS for a passport that they aren’t even using.
In situation’s like Turner’s, it is easier to give up US citizenship than continue to pay the IRS for years, even though her intent is to keep living in Switzerland.
http://rt.com/usa/news/turner-us-swiss-tax-764/
To people like Schumer, renunciation is the same as defection and it’s his divine duty to change the laws to make it so. I hope Ms Turner and the rest of us who choose to renounce can live the rest of our lives in peace without being hounded by career barnacles like him.
Charlie Chaplin made a political statement.
I’m jealous!!!! Can’t wait until I “clarify my situation” to the US Embassy in Bern!
better yet, here is the Contact info for a Memphis TV station
http://www.myfoxmemphis.com/category/240069/about-us
News tips: (901) 320-1340
News Tip E-mail: news@myfoxmephis.com
newspaper: Commercial APPEAL
http://www.commercialappeal.com/staff/
MAYOR
http://www.haywoodcountybrownsville.com/Contacts.aspx
Jo Matherne, Mayor
111 N. Washington Avenue
Brownsville, TN 38012
731-772-1212
E-mail: jmatherne@brownsvilletn.gov
It says that the Mayor wants to learn, why not send her an email and tell her that Tina Turner is Another hero?
I just sent an email to the Mayor—she said she wants to understand. I forgot to tell her that Tina Turner cannot say why she is giving up her citizenship.
I tried to focus on the Point that US Citizens overseas are normal people and that she is Another Hero.
*Even worse than the proposed Ex-patriot Act, I often wonder if Congress will try to devise a way to reinstate US Personhood on Americans who’ve expatriated (especially those who’ve renounced vs relinquished). I wouldn’t put it past them to attempt to pass laws that would effectively force renunciants back into the US tax system and thus forced to file U.S. tax returns again. While I doubt they could get away with this, I still wouldn’t put it past them to try this as a deterrent.
there will likely be reporters Calling to the Mayor—hope that she becomes informed.
and I got the Memphis fox news and newspaper with a forward, too.
Karzai’s Brother Renounces U.S. Citizenship To Enter Afghan PoliticsWonder if he will know he will have an Exit Tax to pay too.
Notice how the media frames this differently from other renunciations: Tina Turner “gives up” or “gives back” her U.S. passport. Whereas if you’re not a Hollywood likeable personality or if you’re perceived to be of a non-liberal political persuasion, you’ll be painted villainously as having “ditched” or “dumped” U.S. citizenship to attempt to turn public opinion against that person.
MonaLisa, if renouncing and even relinquishing become a big enough problem, I would not be surprised at all if they try to make things more difficult. However, and if someone knows to the contrary please speak up, I think the US’s constitution has something in it that grants citizens the right to give up citizenship. There are regulations stipulating the how and why and that would be the only thing they could mess around with.
One of the easiest ways to alleviate the accidental American thing would be to stipulate that the child of a citizen born overseas or a child born in the US but not growing up there would have to actively seek to claim citizenship by age 18 1/2 or it is forfeit. They could also fix it so Americans who relocate and gain citizenship in another country also have to actively seek to retain US citizenship by keeping a current passport.
@ Michael
Yes, they do use carefully selected words to create the perception they wish to implant in people’s brains. That’s how they catapult the propaganda and advance their agenda. It’s a trick, they always use it.
@Michael
It’s easier to vilify ungrateful ‘foreigners’ like Savarin than it is homegrown school-of-hard-knocks graduates like Turner. Besides that, Turner is a Buddhist and has no attachment to money so therefore can be assumed to have renounced for love 😉