UPDATE SEPTEMBER 19, 2015: SEE ALSO DISCLAIMER AND LITIGATION UPDATES.
[This post, which began in May and having over 1000 revisions and 2000 comments, is being retired from service and updates. It lived through the success of reaching a total of $500,000 in donations from our kind, dear supporters who had little money to give, the hope and disappointment with the summary trial decision, and the certainty that we are now finally moving on to the Charter trial.]
CANADIAN CHARTER TRIAL UPDATE:
— We have instructed the Arvay team to prepare for the “Constitutional-Charter” trial. This means that our focus now, as it was in the beginning of our lawsuit, is on the Charter trial.
Unless there is a new expense in the future that we have not anticipated, the monies from your donations will be sufficient to take us through the “constitutional-charter” trial in Federal Court. However, to pay other legal bills we will need additional donations from our supporters, and a request for donations will appear on another post soon.
OUR LITIGATION HISTORY:
One year ago, on August 11, 2014, Litigator Joseph Arvay filed a FATCA IGA lawsuit in Canada Federal Court on behalf of Plaintiffs Ginny and Gwen, the Alliance for the Defence of Canadian Sovereignty (en français), and all peoples.
Because of a Government delay we initiated a “summary trial”, using a portion of the arguments, which offered the possibility of preventing private banking information from being turned over to the IRS before September 30, 2015. See Alliance’s Claims, our Alliance blog, and AUGUST 4-5 SUMMARY TRIAL FILINGS in LITIGATION UPDATES.
Considering the behaviour of Congress and the betrayal of the Republican majority both in the house and senate, not to mention the utter betrayal of the Senate Finance Committee headed by Orin Hatch, legislation is a desirable remedy; yet dubious, considering how these bodies behave.
Actions always speak louder than words. As we observed in our own Senate Finance Committee hearings before the IGA was signed, Bankers concerns outweighed all reasonable and legal arguments concerning privacy and sovereignty.
That illustration was mirrored in 2008 TARP bailout of banks with taxpayer monies. It is now illustrated by Congress, via McConnell and Boehner in funding everything they were elected to DEfund.
Elected representatives heeding banker concerns over those who put them in office is why Greece is now on the verge of collapse. Banker greed. Goldman Sacs profited illegally in bringing in Greece to the EU and now they are fleecing Greece of every asset nailed down and raiding retirement funds. ALL against the explicit wishes of the electorate. Greece contemplates suing. Considering the backbone of their government, one wonders how and when that might occur.
This is how governments are acting all across the globe. Sovereignty means nothing. Banker and Corporate concerns mean everything. TPP means sovereignty is sacrificed to corporate demands for profit. Nestle’s water theft in Canada is a perfect example. ( and if you question the rate at which Nestle has to pay for the water, you will be dragged into a TPP court for threatening profits)
Considering all these events and decisions by governments elected by the people but do Bankers bidding, there really is only ONE solution:
Litigation.
There are two underway:
Our Canadian one is way ahead of the Bopp one in the US. Considering how courts have ruled there in the most recent past it brings into question whether it’s the law they adhere to or political views.
That leaves our lawsuit.
Fast approaching and in need of funds in a very short time:
Unless you live in Iceland, you have a vested interest in the success of our lawsuit.
Please donate today. Often and soon!
http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/DonateADCS.html
Thank you “afternoon donor” for breaking that $40K barrier. We followed Badger’s lead and popped a Good Luck in Court card in the mail today (with 2 “Kings” enclosed). Hope it gets there by Friday.
$39,999 — yes, that looks better. I’ll be able to spring another donation via PayPal by Friday of this week and will wish all of you the best for the following week’s Tuesday and Wednesday in Vancouver — godspeed to the Arvay team.
Stop US abuse of those living outside the US via FATCA. Stop the plunder of our Canadian taxpayer revenues earmarked to doing US bidding as per the FATCA IGA.
Consider that the US financial weapon of FATCA makes NO distinction between financial accounts and institutions in countries like Canada and those of banks like the one in the Byrnes article below.
US extortionate threats to block access to the US financial system are the enforcement inducement behind FATCA – a one size fits all club to bludgeon both financial institutions and accountholders who have done no wrong, as well as those who are alleged to have committed crimes like FBME.
Anything FATCA and FBAR defines as a FFI and a non-US account is to be treated before the fact as guilty and criminal. Every other country that is not the US is ‘foreign’ and guilty before the fact. Every account outside the US is a hidden potentially US taxable ‘foreign’ account. All assets held outside the US are potentially hidden US taxable ‘foreign’ assets. All accountholders living and banking outside the US are potentially criminal money launderers, terror funders, drug lords and UStax evaders. The US refuses to acknowledge or make any distinctions between a bank like they allege FMBE to be (see below), and to my local Canadian credit union.
Consider that our children’s birthday, and education savings account held where they and we live outside the US are to be reported to FINCEN – the very same US agency wielding the Patriot Act, etc. against the Middle Eastern bank described below:
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/intfinlaw/2015/07/fincen-cuts-fbme-bank-from-access-to-us-financial-system.html
Friday, July 24, 2015
‘FinCEN Cuts FBME Bank from Access to U.S. Financial System’
By William Byrnes
“The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) yesterday issued a final rule, pursuant to Section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act, which imposes “special
FINCEN
measure five” against FBME Bank Ltd. (FBME), formerly known as the Federal Bank of the Middle East. Special measure five prohibits U.S. financial institutions from opening or maintaining correspondent accounts or payable through accounts for or on behalf of FBME…….”….
Consider that the US Patriot Act will apply to any of our data collected and remitted to the US under the FATCA IGAs.
What a travesty to be treated like criminals – and have our hard earned non-US taxpayer revenue wasted in implementing a foreign extraterritorial US law.
Donate to the ADCS NOW!!!
Stop our home government from colluding with the US to treat the rest of the planet as criminals and wasting our local post-tax wages and savings to pay for the ‘pleasure’ of funding the Canadian government’s criminal defence of their actions in actively and negligently surrendering our sovereignty to the US Treasury.
“The secret to happiness is freedom… And the secret to freedom is courage.”
Thucydides
Readers inside AND outside Canada who need to understand or clarify why this ADCS legal challenge is important and why you should donate NOW:
Read and re-read this recent comment by USCitizenAbroad; https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2015/07/23/everyone-and-his-brother-if-we-cant-mobilize-our-own-siblings-how-can-we-expect-the-congress-to-care/comment-page-4/#comment-6323438 by
It explains how all our efforts to stop the US from forcing its will on the rest of the globe – like a body snatcher via the persons of individuals it insists on deeming ‘UStaxablepersons’ are COMPLEMENTARY no matter where the efforts are taking place. The Canadian IGA is an important domino in the US extraterritorial FATCA plan for US world domination over the revenues, Treasuries and financial systems of the rest of the globe. IT MUST FALL.
You can be certain that the US government and the present Canadian one are hoping that we will fail to get our challenge heard fairly and democratically. These political Goliaths are hoping that OUR OWN local TAXPAYER resources which they have on tap will win out over OUR OWN modest individual and family resources and prevent us from being fairly heard and having a say over how OUR OWN LEGAL LOCAL SAVINGS and ASSETS are to be treated via the mechanism of FATCA and the US extraterritorial head tax known as CBT!! There is no doubt that it is not JUSTICE that is on the minds of the US and Canadian governments. JUSTICE is NOT their motivation. JUSTICE would not have forced us to this desperate pass.
Failure is not an option. Help us reach this target NOW.
Donate!
http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/DonateADCS.html
Surgite!
Judging from the Democrats Abroad blog, there doesn’t seem to be any support for FATCA or Same Country Exemption. Many of the bloggers want FATCA scrapped.
Also the witch hunt continues by FFIs, their own publicity will increase resistance to FATCA and hopefully contributions to IBS.
Obama talked so much of his fathers homeland on his trip to Kenya. I wonder if he realizes that if Kenya instituted same tax laws he would be paying tax to Kenya. Was a good opportunity to hit him up for some cash. Should not have let him back on Air Force 1 until he wrote a check to the Kenyan treasury even if it would be going into president Kenyatta’s pocket
@Brick Tamland,
re “Obama talked so much of his fathers homeland on his trip to Kenya. I wonder if he realizes that if Kenya instituted same tax laws he would be paying tax to Kenya…….”.
That is what I pose here;
https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2015/07/23/everyone-and-his-brother-if-we-cant-mobilize-our-own-siblings-how-can-we-expect-the-congress-to-care/comment-page-5/#comment-6326403
And too bad Kenya let Obama depart without using a Kenyan passport. As the US did to the Mayor of London Boris Johnson http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/08/opinion/why-im-giving-up-my-american-citizenship-passport.html?_r=0
This is no longer available except for the cache (wonder why?):
“‘I am afraid we have a problem,’ he said. ‘The US Immigration say you have to travel on an American passport if you want to enter the United States.’ B-but I’m British, I said, and my children chorused their agreement. Had the guy stuck around a moment longer, I would have told him how jolly British I was — but luckily for him he’d gone off in search of reinforcements.
When the ranking officer arrived, the story was the same. ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he said, ‘but you’ll have to go to the US Embassy tomorrow morning and get a new American passport.’ But I don’t want an American passport, I said, inspiration striking me. I tell you what: I renounce my American citizenship. I disclaim it. I discard it.
‘That’s not good enough, sir,’ he said. ‘I need some official document saying that you are no longer American,’ and that, of course, is the point of this piece.”…….. from
‘American Passport’
August 29, 2006 By Boris Office in articles 63 317
That’s It Uncle Sam
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:sMpLU4pYAuIJ:www.boris-johnson.com/2006/08/29/american-passport/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca
As the clock counts down to August 4th and 5th, I take my inspiration from Donald Sutherland’s character Oddball in Kelly’s Heroes:
The more I think about this lawsuit, the more I hope we get an injunction ASAP against the Canada Revenue Agency forwarding our data to the evil empire. Being cynically realistic, the US has NO intention of ever offering reciprocity, but they could easily give up on FATCA once we’ve all been “inventoried” after which, why bother to continue with it. Admitting it was “a mistake” would be painless (and insincere). They’ll already have what they wanted all along.
Do I understand that an injunction (or some other word for the same) is part of what’s being sought here?
@PierreD
Please see below from LITIGATON UPDATES on this post which indicates that the Summary Trial is to prevent records from being turned over to the US IRS:
“We made the decision to pursue a summary trial approach (in addition to preparing for the full trial with Charter arguments) that at least offered the potential of interim relief (stop the bank records from being turned over before September 30) rather than to not pursue this approach. Had we not taken this summary trial approach (which may or may not be successful), our inaction in waiting for a Charter trial some time in 2016 would have ensured absolutely that the bank records of innocent Canadians would have been turned over to the IRS by September 30, 2015. We hope that our supporters appreciate our position (see also below).”
@Deckard1138
Yes the clock is ticking and it’s time to HAVE A LITTLE FAITH!
Another donation sent from my family to every single person who the Canadian government threw in the garbage!
Two salmon from the west coast swimming your way 🙂
Under what basis could the government possibly file for an adjournment? I find this VERY worrying.
@ All
Obviously the arrival of a donation by the deadline is getting a bit dicey now for snail mail users. It might make the ADCS team feel better if you let them know that something is on the way but it will probably arrive late. You can send a message to the ADCS team here:
http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/ContactADCS.html
A delay? An adjournment? Good grief! People have made travel plans. Surely the judge will not allow this with only 1 week to go. Now I’m going to step away from the computer to mutter something under my breath about these government lawyers.
I sorta kinda thought that might happen …. evil dirty tactic that it is. I hope that the Govt team will get the Judge vexed with these antics. The Govt team has not yet however stooped to this further dirty move …. kinda like that nonsense about the 100,000 documents …… Let us hope that it does not happen and if it does that the Judge chucks the request for more time through the window.
@Mettleman
I do not have your email but you indicated on IBS that you and your Mom would attend the FATCA Summary Trial. Please see Stephen Kish’s post today regarding possibility of delay in Summary Trial date by Conservative government. Unbelievable! Please watch this site for updates. If you prefer, you can send me your email address and I will update you.
I posted my latest cheque on Friday and it should get to ADCS this week. I hope the adjournment does not occur, so the lawsuit keeps moving. The adjournment possibility and the “Same Country/Safe Harbour” proposal are both dismaying and objectionable. Will this FATCA IGA fight ever end, and will the U.S. ever convert to RBT? I’m happily Canadian only, but this nonsense just goes on and on too long. Meanwhile, I continue trying to help “U.S. person” acquaintances who have had their OMG moments fairly recently and are wondering what to do. I’m still looking forward to some kind of victory party at a pub here in Toronto, but I’m wondering if I will live long enough to be there.
The only sure deadline is the Canadian Federal Election in October, when we can hope to be finally rid of Stephen Harper’s government.
Pat, I can email Mettleman if you like.
@all
As a layman, I suspect that the Judge would throw any such request out due to the irreparable damage that would be done to all persons labelled as “US Persons” if any delay is granted and Arvay wins the case.
@Tricia Moon
Thanks Tricia. Please email Mettleman. Better if everyone knows what’s going on.
got that it. we will be watching and if there is a change in plans we are close enough that it will not be a major interuption for us……aside from being a down low dirty tatic from the other side…….see you all in a week…. i hope…..
Standing by…