The
Infamous "Expat Tax" Moves a Step Closer to Reality...
by BOB BAUMAN, Legal Counsel
As
my colleague Mark Nestmann and I have been predicting for some
time, it appears 2008 could be the year when the Democrat
controlled United States Congress imposes an "exit
tax."
This official "exit tax" would apply to both U.S.
citizens and long-time resident aliens who decide they want to
leave America permanently.
Policymakers slipped this horrendous restriction into a popular
military pension/pay bill, (without hearings or public notice, I
might add), so insiders say President
Bush may actually sign it into law.
This outrage is happening
despite the protections in the U.S. Constitution. The
Constitution guarantees the right to voluntarily end your U.S.
citizenship. It also grants you the right to live and travel
abroad freely and acquire and enjoy second citizenship from
other nations.
Furthermore, the U.S.
Supreme Court has confirmed every one of these basic
rights. (Even the U.N. Charter affirms these rights and in
2004 the European
Court of Justice overruled a similar French exit tax
because it violated the EU treaty on human rights.)
Indeed this confiscatory
exit tax harkens back to Adolf
Hitler's notorious departure taxes that stripped Jews
of their property before they were allowed to escape from Nazi
Germany.
It also brings to mind similar oppressive laws to those
fleeing Stalin's Communist Soviet Union and apartheid-era South
Africa.
Civil
Liberties Be Damned
If the so-called Democrat
Party "liberals," who supposedly advocate civil
rights and liberties, can impose such an oppressive exit tax,
what will happen when Democrats take control of both the
presidency and Congress? (And are the Republicans much
better?)
Could United States
citizens and legal residents suddenly find their right to
travel, their freedom to live in other countries restricted,
or even forbidden? Could such a government also impose
currency exit controls and other extreme measures?
After the 2006 election I
predicted that "Democrats will have the power to write
radical new laws tempered only by the hapless President George
Bush's shaky veto pen." The exit tax is a prime
example.
Europeans
Already Have Trouble Entering the U.S.
If you think travel
restrictions on citizens leaving America are unlikely, check
what's happening to Europeans trying to come into the United
States.
"Europeans traveling
to America could face travel restrictions because of concerns
about terrorism, the U.S. head of homeland security
said." reports The Guardian. "Michael
Chertoff told the BBC that the U.S.
increasingly saw Europe
as a 'platform' for a terrorist attack and he blamed the
current visa waiver program for European citizens as a reason
for America's vulnerability."
Under Chertoff's plan, Europeans and others who now can enter
the U.S. for 90 days without a visa would be required to
notify the U.S. government 72 to 48 hours before they board
their flights.
The Chertoff idea, (which
the Democrat Congress has already authorized), is to exclude
people who pose a possible terrorist threat to its U.S.
citizens. That's all well and good, but it would not take much
to expand exclusion from the U.S. for "terrorism" to
include a host of other supposedly dangerous and
"preventable" alleged crimes - even financial
crimes.
Then this exclusion
principle could be turned around and used to forbid Americans
to travel abroad for various official reasons.
Government
Already Use Passports as Privileges - Not Rights
The U.S. government already
uses your passport to restrict your right to travel, rather
than to guarantee it. The government can restrict your
passport use if you fall behind on paying your taxes, or if
you fail to report worldwide income and assets.
Already the United States can deny a passport simply for being
in debt to the Internal
Revenue Service, due to problems with federal
government agencies or because you may owe more than US$2,500
in back payments for court ordered child support. I'm
not saying travel restrictions and currency controls are
inevitable. But depending on the 2008 election outcome, I
think it could happen.
That means you better get your financial house in order now
and if you’ve been considering a second
passport, start the process now, while you still can.
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