UPDATE SUNDAY NOVEMBER 13, 2016
REINCE PRIEBUS CHOSEN TO BE PE TRUMP’S CHIEF OF STAFF
EXCERPTS:
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald J. Trump on Sunday chose Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee and a loyal campaign adviser, to be his White House chief of staff, turning to a Washington insider whose friendship with the House speaker, Paul D. Ryan, could help secure early legislative victories.
But as chief of staff, Mr. Priebus will be the one who has several hundred White House staff members reporting to him. He will be the primary gatekeeper for Mr. Trump and the person most responsible for steering the president’s agenda through Congress. That role will be especially critical for Mr. Trump, who has never served in government and has few connections to important political figures.
As Mr. Trump denounced the Republican primary process as rigged and, on occasion, threatened to quit the party and run on his own, Mr. Priebus remained neutral. And when Mr. Trump secured the nomination, Mr. Priebus stood by his side.
Mr. Priebus worked with Mr. Trump on the nuts and bolts of presidential politics, trying to smooth his rough edges and staying in close contact as a bare-bones campaign prepared to go up against the Clinton machine.
PRESS RELEASE VIA MR. PRIEBUS JULY 2015
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I found myself wondering just what it is expats will want to focus on now, that the Republicans have the Presidency, and control of the House and the Senate. As Stephen Kish pointed out, this could change in two years (well, really just a bit more than a year as once the campaiging for the interim elections in 2018 start, we will likely have lost our chance to get this done quickly. What we do in the next year is critical to dumping FATCA and CBT.
I started thinking about what they promised and have gone through the Platform. I am going to list the main things I found that relate to our issues; if anyone finds more, please post. I also have two documents that focus specifically on FATCA and RBT as well as the link to Republicans Overseas Resolutions posted long ago on their FB site. It would be helpful if others want to isolate points and phrases to focus on in communications to the Republicans.
People may. may not want to coordinate efforts but I assume there will be letters written, emails sent and so on. You may remember that Congressman Mark Meadows (R NC) introduced H.R. 5935 seeking to have an oversight hearing on FATCA repeal. Once we know the date of the hearings and who will sit on the committee, we would start there I presume. And then follow the movement of what occurs……Calls for witnesses were posted on the Isaac Brock Society indicating interested parties should contact Keith Redmond by email at FATCA_Testimonials@outlook.com
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THE REPUBLICAN PLATFORM
excerpts from sections related to our issues
RESTORING THE AMERICAN DREAM
Fair and Simple Taxes for Growth p 1
The current tax code is rightly the object of both anger and mockery. Its length is exceeded only by its complexity. We must start anew. That will be an enormous undertaking and, if it is to succeed, it must command the attention and approval of the American people………….. We will welcome all to this enterprise — to discuss, debate, challenge, and amend — so that together we can restore economic growth for the American people and, even more important, renew their faith in the future
NB:This is their promise to listen.
Our Tax Principles p 2
To ensure that past abuses will not be repeated, we assert these fundamental principles. We oppose retroactive taxation. We condemn attempts by activist judges at any level of government to seize the power of the purse from the people’s elected representatives by ordering higher taxes. We oppose tax policies that deliberately divide Americans or promote class warfare.
NB:This would deal with the bizarre idea that 877A is retroactive.
To guard against hypertaxation of the American people in any restructuring of the federal tax system, any value added tax or national sales tax must be tied to the simultaneous repeal of the Sixteenth Amendment, which established the federal income tax.
NB:This would eliminate the whole need for filing in terms of taxes as value added or national sales tax will not affect Americans abroad in any significant way.
A Competitive America p 2
American businesses now face the world’s highest corporate tax rates. That’s like putting lead shoes on your cross-country team. It reduces companies’ ability to compete overseas, encourages them to move abroad, lessens their investment, cripples job creation here at home, lowers American wages, and fosters the avoidance of tax liability — without actually increasing tax revenues. A more damaging policy is hard to imagine.
NB:Please see an excellent paper by Roger Conklin which outlines how CBT directly affects Trade.(via The Revenue Act of 1962 & The Tax Reform Act of 1976; the U.S. has never recorded a trade surplus since 1975).
We endorse the recommendation of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, as well as the current Administration’s Export Council, to switch to a territorial system of taxation so that profits earned and taxed abroad may be repatriated for job-creating investment here at home. We believe American companies should be headquartered in America. We should reduce barriers to accomplishing that goal. A Winning Trade Policy International trade is crucial for all sectors of America’s economy. Massive trade deficits are not. We envision a worldwide multilateral agreement among nations committed to the principles of open markets, what has been called a “Reagan Economic Zone,” in which free trade will truly be fair trade for all concerned.
NB:Trade is important to Trump. He needs to know how CBT affects it. If they offer territorial taxation to corporations,they can offer RBT to Americans abroad.
A REBIRTH OF CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT
The Fourth Amendment: Liberty and Privacy p 13
The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) and the Foreign Bank and Asset Reporting Requirements result in government’s warrantless seizure of personal financial information without reasonable suspicion or probable cause. Americans overseas should enjoy the same rights as Americans residing in the United States, whose private financial information is not subject to disclosure to the government except as to interest earned. The requirement for all banks around the world to provide detailed information to the IRS about American account holders outside the United States has resulted in banks refusing service to them. Thus, FATCA not only allows “unreasonable search and seizures” but also threatens the ability of overseas Americans to lead normal lives. We call for its repeal and for a change to residency-based taxation for U.S. citizens overseas.
NB: This needs no comment. Other than it might be pointed out that many of the accounts reported on FBAR and 8938, are registered government plans. Some even include government grants which are taxed. The idea that these can be used for money laundering or terrorism is simply absurd.
GOVERNMENT REFORM
Reforming the Treaty System p 26
We intend to restore the treaty system specified by the Constitution: The president negotiates agreements, submits them to the Senate, with ratification requiring two-thirds of the senators present and voting. This was good enough for George Washington but is too restrictive for the current chief executive, who presumes to bind this country to bilateral and multilateral agreements of his devising. His media admirers portray his personal commitments — whether on climate change, Iranian weapons, or other matters — as done deals. They are not, and a new Republican executive will work with the Congress to re-establish constitutional order in America’s foreign relations. All international executive agreements and political arrangements entered into by the current Administration must be deemed null and void as mere expressions of the current president’s preferences. Those which are in the national interest but would traditionally have been made by treaty must be abrogated, renegotiated as treaties, and transmitted to the Senate for its advice and consent as required by the Constitution. The United States will withdraw from all agreements and arrangements failing those standards.
NB: Bye bye IGAs
Please see Professor Allison Christians excellent paper The Dubious Legal Pedigree of IGAs (and Why it Matters)
Internal Revenue Service p 27
We also support making the federal tax code so simple and easy to understand that the IRS becomes obsolete and can be abolished.
NB: Bye bye OVDP, Streamlined, threats of penalties etc
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Here are three more direct sources of the Republican positions. I will probably do the same with these as above. But the more the merrier!
Resolution Supporting Residence Based Taxation
Resolution toRepeal the Foreign AccountTaxCompliance Act
A proposed RNC Resolution titled — Resolution to Repeal the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) compiled by Republicans Overseas.
My point was simply that if the Trump/Pence administration were the price of getting rid of CBT, I personally would prefer to keep CBT rather than see myself and others suffer the possible consequences of the Trump/Pence administration (potentially irreversible damage to climate, loss of gender/reproductive rights in the US, embrace of white ethnic nationalism, and so on).
It’s an abstract and hypothetical point, obviously – what’s done is done.
And yes, it’s very easy for me to say this because CBT has no impact on me – as a Canadian with dual citizenship living in Canada I currently have zero reason to become compliant.
No, I will not attempt to influence the incoming administration. I neither have nor want a say in US affairs. Though still technically a US citizen, I choose to ignore this fact, and act accordingly. I have renounced on a personal level, and see no need to spend money or file papers to make it official.
Our discussion is pointless in any case because the interests of Americans abroad are likely of no higher priority to this government than they were to the last, and I fully expect that after a very short honeymoon the administration will descend into paralysis, scandal and crisis, and nothing much will change.
Wouldn’t the Republicans Overseas be in a good position to lobby the current US president on FATCA and RBT through connections they have already made?
Nononymous, BCDoc and I are in virtually complete agreement.
@badger
Republicans Overseas has (as I understand it) a strong connection to Reince Priebus. That may be absolute gold. 😉
@Tricia;
I will be glad if relief comes for those ‘abroad’ with no other recourse if a repeal of FATCA, and of extraterritorial CBT comes from this changing of the guard.
I am also with DoD, Nononymous, and BCDoc in terms of issues, stakes and repercussions being ones I cannot make peace with in all other respects.
Badger – I’m with you (and DoD, BCDoc, Nononymous, and probably several others).
As a non-citizen, I had no vote in the election. The electorate has spoken, and we must play the hand we have been dealt. It will be a big relief if DJT follows through on ALL of the RNC platform promises regarding FATCA and RBT. However, the costs in other areas are profound.
Googling ‘Reince Priebus FATCA’ brings up the following from 2014″
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/aug/7/rnc-chairman-targets-federal-banking-law-in-effort/
In the list of hits it’s labelled
“RNC chairman targets federal banking law in efforts to woo voters”. That label, once clicked on, morphs into:
“RNC boss throws weight behind legal effort to overturn overseas banking law
Overturning FATCA, despised by ex-pats, key in Reince Priebus’ Republican Overseas initiative”
The RO initiative served its purpose: the voters (enough of them) were wooed and won, and look who’s going to be Chief of Staff.
To all those cynics sneering at the idea of even lobbying the new administration, I say this: like it or not, they’re about to take office. Instead of pooh-poohing and say, “Ehhn, nothin’s ever gonna change, I won’t help you. Nya nya nya,” why not try? We’ve tried everything else. I mean, what are Nonoymous and others trying to say? We should give up just because past efforts didn’t pan out? That’s loser mentality.
Let’s press the hell out of them to repeal FATCA and switch to RBT. After that we can put to use our individual lobbying expertise, gained on these issues, to press the US government on other issues such as climate change.
Don’t forget to congratulate Mike Lee on being reelected as senator in Utah.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/sep/23/mike-lee-to-fight-us-tax-law-targeting-americans-a/
@Barbara – I’m not sneering at anyone, nor urging others to take one course or another. I’m just commenting on the political realities as I see them.
@Barbara,
I certainly don’t think we should give up. Yes, lobby the incoming administration. I have a daily tweet scheduled for the transition team, and am re-tweeting tweets from others. I don’t have any US representatives to send letters to, but am posting links to the “Lobby the New US Government” page where appropriate on FB. Meanwhile, I’m hedging my bets and keeping the pressure up on my home government as well.
That said, I’m also donating to civil liberties organisations in the US to make sure they are able to keep the new administration in check on the domestic front – I still have family over there and am worried about some of them in the current climate.
I agree with Barbara and Karen.
We all have differing political viewpoints but we are NOT a political website .
We were formed to help all those affected by FATCA and CBT and work towards their repeal.
We should stick to that goal, with whatever tools are at our disposal.
Love Trump or loathe Trump, he has been elected and there is nothing we can do about that.
Surgite
A good point made elsewhere (http://www.expatforum.com/expats/expat-tax/1172226-any-chance-president-trump-gop-will-repeal-fatca.html#post11416426): IRS funding may be frozen or cut, which can only be good news for non-US-resident USPs.
From what I understand, a lot of people voted for Trump IN SPITE of all the terrible things he said. Trump plays to win, and win he did – even if it meant traumatizing half the nation.
The political discourse in American is completely devoid of listening to people they assume have an opposing point of view, labelling each other as “conservative” or “liberal”. Fairness is viewed as a sign of weakness when you need your side to win. That means ignoring or condemning the other side’s point of view as being the reason why everyone’s fighting, or why America is no longer “great”. You see it everywhere. Americans have lost their ability to talk to each other, let alone find common ground they can build on. THAT will surely be their demise, not their latest figurehead.
The nation has been traumatized by these last 8 years. Trump’s fingerprints are not to by found on any of the mess in the States. The dems own the vast majority of it with a little help form the repubs and a lot of help in that they did not offer any real opposition to it.
@iota
“IRS funding may be frozen or cut, which can only be good news for non-US-resident USPs.”
You might want to edit that to read “non-compliant non-resident USPs.” Only a return to RBT would be good news to the tax compliant.
@Bubblebustin – I would have thought a further tightening of the IRS budget would be good news for all. Do you see it as affecting compliant non-US-resident USPs adversely?
The IRS don’t seem to me to offer any assistance at all to non-US-resident USPs trying to comply. They won’t even explain what they require unless you pay them, which to me is outrageous. I don’t see any services that might be adversely affected by further budget cuts.
@iota
That’s one way of looking at it, but the IRS not having the funds to pursue non-residents does not relieve me of anything. I would hear from the IRS if I stopped filing.
@Bubblebustin – ok, I’ll revise my earlier comment:
IRS funding may be frozen or cut, which can only be good news for non-US-resident USPs who don’t wish to comply or who only want to comply enough to renounce.
Cheers, iota 🙂
“I would have thought a further tightening of the IRS budget would be good news for all. Do you see it as affecting compliant non-US-resident USPs adversely?”
Yes. They already closed their offices in US embassies and consulates, closed the web page where non-US-resident USPs could submit questions to obtain useless non-answering answers, don’t reply to most letters from non-US-resident USPs, and cut off most phone calls where Skype now lets us call US 800-phonenumbers. They’ll surely figure out ways to make things worse.
Our only known ally so far, Priebus, is considered by some Republicans to be “the enemy within”.
http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/michael-savage-reince-priebus-enemy-gop/2016/11/14/id/758693/?ns_mail_uid=92171968&ns_mail_job=1696096_11142016&s=al&dkt_nbr=aejxjgn3
Nononymous says:
“Our discussion is pointless in any case because the interests of Americans abroad are likely of no higher priority to this government than they were to the last, and I fully expect that after a very short honeymoon the administration will descend into paralysis, scandal and crisis, and nothing much will change.”
Although I’d like to believe otherwise, I have to agree. Trump appears to be a highly volatile individual. It would be great to see change and I would love to be wrong about this. But it looks like a downhill course from here for the USA. Just to add, home landers don’t seem to be a high priority either to the US government. Perhaps they will start to notice.
Who knows, I could even imagine a situation where Trump’s foreign financial ties – though he seems more likely to have borrowed from offshore than stashed offshore – create enough of a scandal that it would be politically toxic for him to be seen advocating “relief” for any US taxpayer with assets outside the country, wherever they might be resident. Purely hypothetical scenario, but at this point anything is possible.
The way I see my situation – as a Canadian living in Canada who happens to have been born in the US and who is fully and happily non-compliant – is that CBT is not an immediate threat to me. It’s a very distant potential over-the-horizon threat that maybe one day in the future I’ll need to deal with. If Trump magically made FATCA go away, great, one less thing to worry about, but I’m not going to hold my breath. Instead, it’s easy to ignore the IRS. Don’t file tax returns or FBARs. If your bank asks about US citizenship, don’t answer truthfully. Simple and effective. If you have no US assets or income, you needn’t concern yourself.
US citizens living in other countries have a more difficult time of it, I realize.