Comment by abellerose | Hacker News Reader

Comment by abellerose | Hacker News Reader

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I tried to get rid of my US citizenship while residing in Canada. I found out about the $2.5k and cannot pay that while I’m not in a great financial situation to afford giving away that much. Also I suffered conversion therapy in Michigan against my will. So I greatly despise the idea of the US ever getting a dime from me. Luckily my name is different between citizenships and I’ve not disclosed being a US citizen to banks. Anyway I’ll be dead by cancer in the near future so I’m not that concerned but I wanted to share my experience. I contacted the US embassy by email about not being able to pay but greatly wanting to drop US citizenship because of past trauma that effects my health. The agent just sent an email that looks like a template explaining all must pay 2.5k and he didn’t respond to any following responses I sent. It feels like extortion and really should be considered unconstitutional. I’m writing from a hospital bed on my phone so I apologize for the bad grammar mistakes

As a fellow expat who would very much like to get rid of my US citizenship too, I can tell you my experience with Americans is that they are not happy that anyone gets out and doesn't have to deal with the same crap they deal with. Tell them you like the life/people/culture in country X better and they get upset, defensive, angry even, like you wronged them by calling attention to the reality that its not actually a very nice place to live, and they know it, and they know they are stuck there. More than anything, I believe this essential truth about American character explains things like this $2.5K "fee" and the spineless response from the embassy you got. It's all just to fuck with you, cause you got away and don't have to live around those people and their crazy anymore.

Are you saying a name change might be the way out of this?

Yes, I have no way of knowing if that’s the reason why I haven’t been contacted by banks or the US but I assume it’s a good possibility. They probably just scan a list of names with birthdates. Unless you’ve already reported being a US citizen then they probably have an easy way of contacting you.

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